


Budapest

by JinxQuickfoot



Series: Whumptoberverse [16]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Awesome Sam Wilson, BAMF Clint Barton, Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov Friendship, Clint Barton & Tony Stark Friendship, Clint Barton Feels, Clint Barton Whump, Day 16, Gen, Hostage Situations, Hurt Clint Barton, Hurt Tony Stark, James "Rhodey" Rhodes & Tony Stark Friendship, Kidnapping, Protective James "Rhodey" Rhodes, Protective Natasha Romanov, Protective Peter Parker, Protective Steve Rogers, Tony Stark Whump, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-29
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:47:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 23,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28404240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JinxQuickfoot/pseuds/JinxQuickfoot
Summary: Whoever they were, they were getting better. Every round of the simulation they learned a little more, took a little more, built up the world around him into something he might just believe. But they couldn’t do it all. They always got at least one detail wrong, and then Clint would know, he’d know. And then the assholes would wipe his mind and start again from scratch.----------------------------------------------------------------------------Turns out it's difficult to derail a hostage situation when it's a friend doing the hostage-taking.
Relationships: Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov, Clint Barton & Tony Stark
Series: Whumptoberverse [16]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1921831
Comments: 123
Kudos: 153
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Whumptober 2020 Day 16
> 
> Prompts: Forced to Beg/Hallucinations/Shoot the Hostage
> 
> Relationship: Clint & Natasha
> 
> Can be read as a standalone but exists in the same timeline as the rest of the Whumptoberverse.

It was the purple cup that set it off.

It had been a joke between Tony and Clint ever since the early days of the Tower. Tony had long since accepted that, whatever security measures he could think up, Clint Barton would find a way past them. Tony no longer jumped and swore when Clint dropped into his workshop from the ceiling vents, which, Clint had to admit, took half the fun out of it. Now, he’d sigh, push away whatever he was working on, and offer Clint a drink.

Forcing Tony to take a break had become half the reason Clint started to visit, and Tony had stopped resisting - physically at least, there was still a lot of verbal griping - after a few months of Clint dropping in. He never said that was why he was there, but they both knew. So Tony would dig up whatever drink was in the workshop - coffee or scotch, the time of day having nothing to do with which one he would produce - and they would, for lack of a better word, chat.

Tony always poured Clint’s drink in the blue cup.

It was a dumb, childish joke even to them, but it had become part of the ritual, so it stayed. Clint asked for the purple cup. Tony gave him the blue. Later, Clint would steal the red in retaliation.

They had been chatting about nothing, some app Tony was working on for the Starkphones as a puff piece for his long-suffering PR team, swapping anecdotes about Peter and Wanda - their respective charges - when it happened.

Tony had poured the coffee into the purple cup and handed it straight to Clint.

And Clint had known.

_“Clint.”_

He wasn’t sure how long they been crouched in the corner of Tony’s workshop, pressed up against one of the billionaire’s vintage cars. Clint usually had a decent handle on his internal clock, but time was weird in this place, stretching and condensing until a minute could become an hour and vice versa. He didn’t know if that was on purpose to disorientate him further, or a side effect of whatever tech they were using to fuck with his head.

“Clint,” Tony tried again, hands scrabbling at where Clint was holding him in a headlock. “At least talk to me, asshole. What the hell?”

“You didn’t give me the blue cup.”

_“What?”_ Tony tugged uselessly at Clint’s hold on him. “Is…is this a joke? Because, ok Barton, very funny. Now get the hell off me.”

Clint tightened his hold instead, resulting in a cut-off choking noise. The sound pulled at him like they knew it would, so he shut off that part of himself like he’d learned to do since he was eight. He was trusting survival instincts only.

Whoever they were, they were getting better. Every round of the simulation they learned a little more, took a little more, built up the world around him into something he might just believe. But they couldn’t do it all. They always got at least one detail wrong, and then Clint would know, he’d _know._ And then the assholes would wipe his mind and start again from scratch.

They were clearly trying something new this time because they usually restarted the simulation once Clint had figured out he was in one. They had sent Natasha a lot before they realized that mistake. Years of partnership had taught Clint Natasha’s every tick, every tell, every idiosyncrasy, even the ones she hid from herself. The first time he’d figured it out they had her kill him. He hadn’t seen it coming, hadn’t had time to defend himself as she’d taken him down and straddled him before pushing both of her thumbs through his eyes.

Even though the world they’d created around him was false, the pain certainly wasn’t.

He’d started to remember after a time, some of that well-honed survival instinct winning out after being repeatedly killed - by Bucky, by Steve, by Maria. He’d remember all the previous simulations, all the previous deaths by friends, none of them quick.

So he’d started killing them first. 

They’d changed tactics after that because, damn, he’d give the bastards this - they learned. So they sent Wanda or Peter, crude imitations that he’d seen straight through. Even after the twentieth, thirtieth, fiftieth time, he _knew_ it wasn’t them; the youngest Avengers were in the public eye the least, so his captors had the least to work with there. It didn’t make it any easier to snap their necks as they begged him not to.

On the last round, they’d turned Peter into Cooper just as Clint had delivered the fatal blow and had let him sit with the corpse until they rebooted him. Again.

Tony - or whatever fake version of Tony they had trapped him in here with, and he had to admit it was a particularly _good_ fake version - was still struggling to draw air, scrabbling at Clint’s hold on him. Clint loosened his grip a fraction, enough for the imitation to gulp down a desperate breath, still trying to elbow his way out.

“What’s your game?” Clint shouted at the ceiling, making Tony flinch.

“There’s no _game_ -”

“I know this isn’t real, you bastards! Whatever you’re trying to get out of me, this won’t work!”

Tony went rigid and, Clint had to hand to it them, they really knew how to sell a scene. Feeling Tony shake would be too much, too obvious, but instead he could feel Tony trying very hard _not_ to shake, to remain calm as he started to reason.

“Clint. Listen to me. I really, really need you to listen to me, ok?” Tony’s voice had gone soft, some imitation of comfort, like he was talking to a crazy person. Clint wasn’t crazy. He’d never been crazy. It had always been the world around him that was insane. “You’re not back there. We got you out, remember? We rescued you a week ago.”

And then Clint did remember, just like that, because these assholes could do that too. Implant a memory, weaving imitations into his mind as well as his senses. “I’m not falling for that. Try harder.”

“Ok. Shit, ok. You and Nat have a running thing about Budapest that you’ve never told any of us about. You have a nest in the east wing vent you thought no one knew about until Sam and Rhodey filled with it pineapples. You eat Nutella and liver sausage sandwiches like a heathen.”

“You’ve told me all that before.”

“ _When?_ This isn’t whatever fantasyland they had you in! This is real. I’m real. And that is my very real neck you are an inch away from breaking. I know things haven’t exactly been peachy between us the past few months but I think murdering a teammate is still a bit far, even for you.”

“Interesting,” Clint muttered. This was definitely new, but it made sense. They’d reached a stalemate with Clint figuring out the simulation and killing whatever teammate they put in front of him. So now they were going to try and convince him that this was real, that he hadn’t figured anything out at all.

He let his grip on the fake Tony slacken, just a little. Fine, he’d play ball. Better than being snapped back to the beginning, back into blissful ignorance before he figured it out all over again.

And, if it got too much, he could always kill this Tony and force them to restart.

The door to the workshop whipped open, Sam’s familiar voice calling across the space. “Clint? Tony? F.R.I.D.A.Y. said you needed urgent - shit.” Sam broke off as he rounded a workbench and saw them huddled on the floor together.

“He thinks he’s back there,” Tony got out before Clint could speak. “He doesn’t think we’re real.”

Sam’s eyes widened for a second before he settled into the calm, pararescue persona. “Ok. Clint? We’re going to work together to figure this out.”  


“Sure,” Clint bit back. “Sure, fine, let’s talk. How long do you think you can keep this up? My team - my _real_ team - is on the way, you must know that.” And by team he really meant Natasha. Fucked up situations like this were always going to be on the cards for him, it was part of the job, and the only way he could keep going was knowing that Natasha would be out there looking - either for him or for the people who would eventually kill him. It was an unspoken pact they had with each other. He just had to hold on and not give anything away.

Natasha would get him out. She always did.

“We’re your real team,” Sam pressed, still in that maddeningly calm tone because, a hostage negotiation? Seriously? They were really fishing in the bottom of the simulated barrel for ideas here. “I’m the real Sam. That’s the real Tony. We rescued you.”

“Uh-huh. Yeah, I have that very convenient memory crammed into my noggin now, thanks.”

Sam lowered himself to the floor so he and Clint were eye level, moving into a cross-legged position. “You have a nest in the east wing you think no one knows about.”

“Your pathetic imitation of Stark already tried that one.”

“Hey,” Tony protested, but Clint was only up for dealing with one stolen friend’s voice at a time, thank you very much, so he pressed down on the very-real feeling windpipe under his arm, cutting off the rest of Tony’s words.

“Ok,” Sam continued, shooting a nervous look at Tony. “You have a secret farmhouse that no one but us -”

Clint twisted Tony’s neck, just a little, enough for a gasp of panic to leave his lips, shutting Sam up mid-sentence. “Don’t bring them into this. I’m already going to kill you all for that little stunt you pulled with Cooper.” And shit, no, they knew about Cooper. Had he given it away in a previous simulation, before he figured it out? “To be clear - I was going to kill you anyway. But now it’s going to happen a lot slower.”

Tony’s breaths were growing ragged. “I hear you,” Sam said, and Clint actually laughed at the words. Where had they got this from; negotiating 101? And, ok, Sam probably would go textbook if he was actually here, but that didn’t mean that Clint wasn’t seeing right through it. “Why don’t we try and give each other what we need? I need you to let go of Tony. What do you need?”  


To go home; either one, farmhouse or Compound. Laura or Natasha. To know his head wasn’t being fucked with for once in his miserable life. “Tell me why you’re doing this.”

“I need you to elaborate.”

“Why not just restart the simulation? I know it’s not real.”

“Because you’re not in a simulation, Clint. I’m real. Tony’s real. I know you don’t want to hurt him, or anybody else.”

Clint narrowed his eyes at him. “So that _is_ your game.”

“None of us are playing a game.”

“You’re trying to convince me it’s real. Like a video game. We keep getting stuck on this level. You’re trying to get past it.”

Sam briefly locked eyes with Tony, who was being uncharacteristically quiet, trying not to set Clint off enough to actually twist his throat until it broke. Clint could. He could so easily. But he was sick of getting stuck on the same level too.

“Fine,” he agreed. “Let’s play, assholes, see who wins.”

Sam seemed to take that as progress. “What would it take for me to convince you this is real?”

“Natasha,” Clint replied immediately. “You can’t get her right - you know you can’t. That’s why you dropped her, what, fifty of these ago? Sixty?”

“Natasha’s booked in for another round in the Cradle, you know that,”  Sam pressed.

“Convenient.”

”It’s the truth.”

“Fine. Bucky, then.”

Tony swore under his breath. Sam darted his eyes to him again saying, “I don’t think this is the best place for Bucky to be right now.”

There was a second opening of the workshop door, although it didn’t open all the way, the newcomer announcing himself first. “Clint? It’s Steve. I’m going to come in - is that ok?”

Clint raised his eyebrows at the fake Sam. “You’ve already done Steve. Several times. It didn’t work. None of it worked. I’m not telling you shit.”

“We’re not asking you to tell us anything,” Sam assured him, as the workshop door opened the rest of the way and heavy footsteps brought Steve into view as well. He looked like he had just come from the gym, mid-workout, t-shirt almost soaked through. Clint had to admit it was a nice touch.

Steve spread his hands as he took a step forward. “That’s close enough,” Clint ordered. “On the floor. Sit like Stepford-Falcon is.”

“Ok.” Steve lowered himself until he was also sitting cross-legged. It wasn’t an easy position from which to lunge at Clint if his captors decided to have Steve or Sam kill him and restart. Clint was going to have some vivid nightmares about Steve smashing his head open on a bench corner when this was all over. “Tony? Are you ok?”

“He’s fine,” Clint snapped back. “I’m sure he’s totally fine. He better either be in that workshop of his - the real workshop - tracking me down or already on his way with the rest of you to come pick me up, because I'm getting real sick of this bullshit.”

“He thinks he’s back in the simulation,” Sam explained. 

“F.R.I.D.A.Y. said,” Steve replied. There was something…off about that. There was something off about all of this but something specific there that Clint couldn’t pin down. Then Steve was back to talking to Clint, and the feeling was gone. “We’re here to help.”

Clint’s eyes darted from Sam to Steve, to the familiar faces these assholes were using against him, trying to work out their plan. They didn’t really think they could convince him, could they?

Maybe they could. They’d tried pretty much everything else.

_Natasha’s coming,_ Clint reminded himself. _Just play along until she gets here. Better to stay aware. String this out._

“We’re not going to hurt you,” Steve continued, all Captain America now, and yeah, they could have pulled this cheap impression from a number of different sources. Clint didn’t bother to hide his smirk - these idiots were going to have to do a whole lot better than that. “We just want to talk. So why don’t you let go of Tony so we can do that?”

“And then what happens?” Clint shot at him. “What’s next in the script? Do you tie me down? Take me off to some fake-ass psych-ward and convince me I’m crazy until I believe this is real? Is that the new game plan?”

“Clint, there’s no game plan,” Sam insisted. “You’re our friend. Tony’s our friend. We just want you both to be okay.”

So they were going for the long game. Ok, fine. Clint didn’t like to play the long game, that was much more in Natasha’s ballpark, but he could when it was needed. Days camped out in sniper nests proved that.

“We went on a mission two months after you joined,” Steve started. “Out in Belarus. We were chasing -”

“I’ve tried that,” Sam cut in and - there it was again. That off feeling. “It didn’t work. He thinks they know everything we do.”

“Not everything,” Clint corrected him. “Or there wouldn’t be any point to this, would there?” He looked around the workshop. “What are you after this time, huh? New S.H.I.E.L.D. intel? Avengers’ secrets? Tony’s tech? You do keep bringing us back to his workshop after all. Or is that the only location you thought to properly map out before you mindfucked me.”

It was clever, Clint had to admit, the way they had slightly adjusted the expressions on Sam and Steve’s faces. They were both putting forth the calm, logical, let’s-not-kill-the-hostage persona, but Sam was holding up better than Steve was. Steve’s eyes were betraying his otherwise neutral expression, darting to Tony with increasing trepidation.

“You’re really going in for the details this round,” Clint muttered. His back was starting to ache from being propped up against the car, but he tucked that into the category of ‘things my survival mode is resolutely ignoring right now’.

“I have to say though, three simulated Avengers in a room is quite the achievement,” Clint added. “I don’t think you’ve gotten to that number before though. Close, but no cigar, and all that.”

“What does that mean?” Sam pressed.

Clint indicated his captive. “Can only have two of you talking at once though, huh? Should have kept your Captain America doll on the shelf for this one. I don’t think it’s possible for Tony Stark to be quiet for this long.”

Steve and Sam shared a glance before Steve leaned forward, careful not to make the gesture seem threatening. “Clint…you’re not letting him speak.”

_What?_ Clint turned down his survival mode a little, allowing the sounds of Tony’s gasping breaths to penetrate his consciousness.

“You’re choking him,” Steve pressed, more of the calm persona crumbling with the words. “Clint, please, just -”

Clint responded by pressing harder on Tony’s throat, making both Steve and Sam start forward. “Well, it’s not like any of you even need to breathe, so.”

“Barton!” Steve’s voice raised a few decibels. “I don’t want to hurt you. But I will if you don’t lay off.”

Clint debated. There was a part of him that just wanted to end this; a selfish part. The beginnings of the simulations were so much easier, before he remembered that he was in this shit show of a life, because Cap had called saying Wanda was in trouble so he had left his farm and his wife and his kids and walked back into this waking nightmare of an existence.

But he knew he couldn’t. He couldn’t risk becoming ignorant again, risk giving away whatever information they were pressing him for. So he relaxed his hold on Tony, trying to ignore the relieved gasps of air the engineer hauled in after, the way he jerked against Clint’s body, both of their hearts racing.

“Jesus, Barton,” Tony croaked. “I am never offering you a drink in my workshop - anywhere, actually - ever again. Your coffee privileges have been officially revoked.”

Sam and Steve glanced at each other, each looking to the other for help and then it clicked; where that off thing was coming from.

“Huh,” Clint mused. Tony had started squirming in the looser hold, but halted when Clint shook him roughly. “Stop that. I’m thinking. You too,” he shot at Steve when he opened his mouth to start negotiating again. “Everyone just…just stop for a minute.”

Both Sam and Steve seemed hesitant, but when Clint made no move to start choking Tony again, they seemed to make a mutual agreement not to speak. Which is exactly what Clint was about to challenge.

Because Sam and Steve had been talking to each other. His captors had made that mistake early on, initiating a conversation between Tony and Rhodey that had faulted when the two simulations had started to imitate each other to the point of glitching out. They hadn’t tried again after that, quickly rebooting Clint and starting over.

Which was setting all kinds of sparks off in Clint’s brain. He usually took a fight-your-way-out-leave-no-prisoners approach whenever he fell into enemy hands, but he could be wily when he wanted to be. They weren’t going to let him out of this hellhole of a simulation? Fine. He was going to break their precious torture toy.

Or, more precisely, he was going to make _them_ break it.

“Tell the story of how you met,” he ordered, making everyone in the room jump except for Tony, who was back to trying to hold very still so as not to receive a deadly spinal fracture.

“Ok,” Steve started. “I was out jogging when I saw Sam -”

Clint cut him off. “No, not to me. Tell each other. Alternate sentences. Humor me,” he added, shifting to bring Tony fully back into the vigilant death grip. That got them moving.

“Don’t choke him again,” Steve said quickly. “We’ll do it. Ok. I was living around D.C., and in the mornings I liked to go jogging, and one morning -”

“That’s enough,” Clint interrupted. “Wilson’s turn. Go.”

Sam took it in stride. “I was out on my usual morning run when I see this guy go past me, super fast.” He looked to Steve, passing the ball back.

Steve took it. “Well, it’s customary when running that, if you’re lapping someone, you say “On your left” so they aren’t startled by you passing. It’s etiquette.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t exactly care about etiquette that day, did you Cap?”

“It’s polite!”

“Yeah, it’s polite. The _first_ time.”

“Not my fault you run slow.”

“Yeah, why don’t we have a foot race between me and the scrawny pre-serum you, see who wins then, Rogers?”

The banter was all false bravado, trying to get Clint to relax, and neither of their hearts was in it. That didn’t matter. What mattered was that neither of them were glitching yet, and they had been talking a lot faster than the Tony and Rhodey of the earlier simulation had. “Stop,” Clint ordered them, and they did immediately. “Tell the Triskelion story now. Alternating sentences. And you,” he said into Tony’s ear. “Walk me through the raid we did on the third Hydra base after they were exposed in S.H.I.E.L.D. _Go.”_

The three men all looked at one another, and then followed Clint’s instructions. On any other day this would be beyond hilarious, having three teammates having to play a ridiculous game of ‘Hawkeye Says’ at his whim. But he could still feel Tony’s erratic pulse under his arm, the occasional break he took in the story to suck in breath. He was going to kill these bastards when he got out of here, because that was a whole new level of cruel.

But Clint was used to cruel. He could deal with it.

“Ok!” Clint gave up as the three voices droned on, with no glitching in sight. That was fine. He’d make them do more. He’d burn their damn mindfucker machine from the inside out. “Three at once is impressive,” Clint gave them. “F.R.I.D.A.Y.?”

_“Yes, Agent Barton?”_

“Who else is in the building?”

_“Colonel Rhodes returned to the Compound approximately three minutes ago and is on his way here. Doctor Banner and Mr Parker are also on the premises.”_

Tony went rigid under Clint’s grip. “Not Peter,” he rasped, tugging at Clint’s hands again. “Don’t you dare bring him into this.”

“Why, because I know he’s fake every time?”

“Clint,” Steve said softly. “If whoever had you couldn’t do a good imitation of Peter, why would a fake F.R.I.D.A.Y. bother saying he was in the building?”

Clint glared back at him. “I’m guessing so you could say exactly that. F.R.I.D.A.Y.? Who definitely isn’t F.R.I.D.A.Y. but whatever dicks thought kidnapping me was a good idea? Get Rhodey in here.”

_“He is already approaching the workshop and is informed of the situation.”_

Clint felt Tony relax, just slightly, and yep - that was smart of them. For a time, Clint wasn’t sure anything could match the bond he had with Natasha, except maybe Steve and Bucky. But after seeing Tony and Rhodey fight together, both on the battlefield and off, he understood. Rhodey was both Tony’s safety net and also someone to kick him in the ass when he needed it. Nearly everyone in Tony’s life, pre-Avengers, had either not given a damn about his wellbeing or had pretended to care about it for ulterior motives. Rhodey had been the exception; perhaps the first person ever who had sort Tony out not for his brain or his money or his looks, but simply for his company.

It had taken Clint a little longer to find out what Tony gave to Rhodey in return, but once he saw it it was obvious. He knew firsthand what it was like to be the rock for someone who was suspicious of everyone else. How that level of camaraderie and trust could make you feel. How fulfilling and intense love could be from someone who trusted themselves to love so few people in the first place. It was a friendship hard-won over time, but one you got back tenfold and then some.

Rhodey didn’t bother knocking; the sound of his leg braces could be heard down the corridor through the still-open door. He half-ran to where Steve and Sam were sitting, only halting when Clint said, “That’s far enough.”

Unlike the others, Rhodey focused on Tony first. “Hey. You ok?”

“I don’t have any speeches on for the next week do I?” Tony’s voice was a hoarse croak. “Might have to cancel. A tragedy, I know.”

“You can stop doing that,” Clint said to the ceiling. “You figured out how to have them talk to each other, gold star.” He flicked his eyes between the three Avengers in front of him, checking for missing details, glitches, _anything._

There was not a hair out of place, which meant it was time to push things up a notch. He let himself grin a little as he said the next part. “Change clothes.”

They all stared at him, unsure. Sam spoke first, dropping the negotiator act. “I swear to god, Barton, if this is some elaborate, fucked-up revenge prank for the pineapples -”

“Sam,” Steve warned, eyes darting to Tony before refocussing on Clint. “I won’t fit either Sam or Rhodey’s clothes.”

“Then they can swap, and you can strip,” Clint shot back at him. “Or don’t,” he added when they still hesitated. “And prove my point that you’re not real and changing your appearance is a step too far. Because if you’re just simulations then I might as well -” He pulled on Tony’s throat and suddenly there were clothes hitting the floor. They all hesitated when they got to their boxers, and Clint would have burst out laughing at the ridiculous picture in front of him if he couldn’t feel Tony practically vibrating from tension in his grip.

“You can leave those on,” he decided, and the room seemed to breathe a collective sigh of relief as Sam tossed Rhodey his clothes and vice versa, while Steve was left to shiver, nearly-naked. Before they got dressed, Clint raked their bodies for every tell-tale scar he knew and yep, they were all there. Every one. And even after the clothes were on (or off, in Steve’s case), there wasn’t a single glitch. Not a damn thing.

And for the first time, Clint felt the seeds of doubt creeping in.

He crushed them the moment he felt them. That’s what his captors wanted him to think.

“Ok, we changed clothes,” Sam said. “We all spoke at the same time, we’ve known the answer to every question you asked. Maybe you can give us something in return, yeah?”

“And what would that be, _Sam?”_

Sam ignored the insinuation in the last word. “How about you tell us where your head is at.”

Clint’s eyes darted between the three of them, calculating.

“What else do you need?” Steve urged him. “Tell us, it’s done. Anything to convince you we’re real, and you’re here, and you’re safe. You’re _safe,_ Clint.”

“Hold on. Nearly there.” It took a moment to decipher Rhodey’s words, until Clint realized that they were for Tony, not him. _“Mens et Manus.”_

“What?” Clint’s head snapped around to Rhodey as he heard a wry laugh slip from Tony’s lips. “What did you just say?” Because he had never heard that before, didn’t even know what it meant. He’d never picked up on any Latin, despite Natasha’s attempts. 

Rhodey put his hands up placatingly, “Just an old joke between me and Tony, ok?”

Shit. _Shit._ Out of all the tricks they’d try to pull, trying to force fake information was…new. Everything the others had said he had known, but he had never heard those words passed between Tony and Rhodey before. Was that the point? Confuse him further?

“Explain it,” Clint demanded.

“It’s kind of a you-had-to-be-there thing,” Tony said. “It’s not even -”

“Stop,” Clint snapped. “Stop talking.”

It was probably one of the few times in his life that Tony did.

Clint’s back was really starting to hurt, but it was the growing numbness in his legs that made him shift, pulling Tony closer towards him to accommodate the change. He could feel the tension in the air like smog as he did so, each Avenger in front of him ready to lunge forward and snatch Tony away. As if any of them would be quick enough.

“Tell us where your head’s at,” Sam repeated in a low voice. “Talk to us. How can we help?”

Clint’s eyes darted between all three of them. He was close. Surely he was close. This was more than the simulation had even been able to do before. It felt almost real.

_No._ Clint slammed the brake on those thoughts. They were tricking him. It wasn’t real. It _wasn’t._

Because if it was -

Clint ran his eyes again over the faces of his three patient, but also very ready-to-attack-if-needed, friends. Trust hadn’t been in high demand over the Compound these past few months - not that Clint had ever really been into the whole ‘trust’ thing anyway - but things had been improving. In incremental amounts, and the slowest with Tony, but they had been improving.

And if this was real - which it wasn’t, but if it was - Clint had just undone a whole heap of that work.

“Clint -” Steve started but Clint shushed him.

“Let me think. Goddamnit, just let me think for one second. Actually, all of you back on the floor. Legs crossed.”

They complied, Sam helping Rhodey, the movement complicated with the braces now digging into his bare legs. He tried to help him into the cross-legged position even as Rhodey winced in pain.

“He’s on the floor,” Tony said after a couple of minutes of Rhodey struggling. “That’s enough, right?”

Clint hesitated, trying to see the trick.

“Come on,” Tony pressed, a note of pleading there. “None of them are going to try anything while we’re playing Mousetrap with my neck over here.”

Clint relented. “Fine. But sit separately.”

Rhodey breathed a sigh of relief as he knelt instead, Sam scooting over to put some distance between them. They sat there like patient school children, waiting for Clint’s next instruction.

Clint tried to reason through it. They weren’t asking him anything. They weren’t trying to get him to do anything, except let go of Tony. They were just trying to convince him this was real.

“What happens if I let him go?” Clint bit out, stalling for time, trying to suss out their next move.

A glimmer of hope. A fraction of the tension lifted from the room.

“What are you afraid of happening?” Sam replied. “Talk to us. Tell us where you’re at.”

Clint revisited his dragged to a fake psych-ward idea. “Where will you put me?”

“What do you mean?” Sam pressed, the other two letting him take the lead. “Why do you think we’re going to put you somewhere?”

“He thinks you’re going to stash him away in a nuthouse,” Tony got in. “Listen, Legolas, we’ve known you’re short a few marbles since day one. We all are - no one gets into this business, let alone _stays_ in this business, without a few cracks forming. Yours truly is an excellent example of that.”

“Clint, is that true?” Sam asked. “Are you worried about us trying to put you in psych?”

“Are you?” Clint snapped back.

“I’m not going to rule out a counselor after whatever you went through a week ago,” Sam replied. “It appears it was a lot more traumatic than we gave it credit for, and I apologize for not getting you the help you needed. But we’re not going to lock you up anywhere if you can prove you’re not a danger to us or to anyone else. And you can prove that by letting Tony go, ok?”

Clint snorted. “Really? You’re going for the whole ‘Sam-as-everyone’s-therapist’ trope?”

Sam ignored that. “Just tell us what we can do.”

Clint narrowed his eyes at him. “No psych.”

“No psych,” Sam promised.

“Don’t…” What was the hell was he doing? “Don’t lock me up.”

“We won’t do that either. Right, Steve?”

Steve took his cue. “Of course not. We understand. We’re not angry, are we?” He looked at Rhodey.

“Hell, no. We’ve got your back, always.”

The pieces were falling into place. The fact that there were multiple people in the room, all acting independently, who could interact with each other, who could change their appearance without glitching. All the tiny details, the very real feeling of the sweat starting to soak through Tony’s AC/DC band T onto Clint’s flannel shirt; the genius’s slight shivers, the very cautiously controlled breathing. Tony who Clint had given a black eye, some nasty bruises and a lawsuit to boot just a few weeks ago because Tony had stepped in to help out his freaked out ass in medical.

_Again - what the_ hell _was was he doing?_

Even as the realization washed over him, he still couldn’t quite bring himself to let go of his leverage. The survival instincts he had let take over were clinging on tight, refusing him to lower his defenses even a fraction, demanding he hold on to the one piece of control that he had.

“What do you need?” Sam said, yet again. 

“Tony,” Clint said softly, and felt the man in his arms stiffen. “Are you…are we…”

“Hey,” Tony assured him. “No harm, no fowl. _Fowl_ , get it.”

Rhodey managed a smile. “That’s weak, even for you, Tones.”

“What do you mean, _even for me?_ My puns are historical documents. And once birdbrain here lets me off this rather uncomfortable workshop floor I’ll be back to top form. No damage done.”

Clint could see right through what they were trying to do. _Do you see how we’re bantering, Barton? Look how it’s fine, totally fine, that you’re using one of our friends as a human shield right now. We’re still all buddies, ok?_

“Sorry,” Clint whispered in Tony’s ear, starting to slacken his grip. He saw Rhodey glance at Steve, saw Steve tense, ready to pull the engineer out of Clint’s arms the second he was clear, but Tony shook his head, telling them to stay back. Telling them to allow Clint to let him go on his own terms.

“Hey,” Tony said, unusually soft. “Some terrible people put your head through some fucked up shit. I get it. But they’re dead now, and you’re back with us. The only thing I’m mad about is that this little escapade wasted a perfectly brewed coffee and a very expensive shot of scotch.”

Clint had almost let him go. Steve had abided by Tony’s warning and not grabbed him, and Tony was sitting still, waiting for Clint to let go of him entirely before he moved. So he was taken off guard when Clint lunged forward and pulled Tony flush against him again, resulting in a surprised yelp from the engineer and panicked shouts from the others in the room.

“You’ve proved you can all talk at once!” Clint yelled at them. “So now, just one of you. It’s too…it’s too much.”

“Ok,” Sam slipped into the role of negotiator again as Clint glared at Steve, who had sprung to his feet and was halfway to him and Tony.

“Sit your ass back down, Rogers.”

Steve was clearly trying to stay calm, but frustration was rolling off him in waves. “You were going to let him go.”

“Yeah, and then you fucked up,” Clint snapped back at him. 

“Steve, sit,” Sam ordered. “Clint, what do mean we fucked up? What happened to bring you back to the idea that this wasn’t real?”

Clint smirked at him. “You’ve been reading too many tabloids. Tony Stark hasn’t had a drink since Sokovia.”

The room fell into dead silence. The only sounds were Tony’s harsh breathing, and the scrape of Rhodey’s braces as he tried to shift into a more comfortable position without setting Clint off further.

“You said scotch,” Clint pressed. “Tony doesn’t drink anymore, idiots.”

“I…” It was the first time Tony had sounded unsure, and he dipped his head the best he could with Clint holding him by the throat, not wanting to make eye contact. “I was sober for a long time. And I’ve been trying, really. But ever since Siberia,” Clint saw Steve tense, “I’ve been slipping up. Just a few times. Maybe more than a few times.” His tone suddenly changed as he laughed. “This isn’t some really screwed-up intervention, is it? Because if so, I’ll hand it to you; you got me good. I’ve been totally scared straight.”

“Tony doesn’t drink,” Clint insisted. “Ok. You know what? I’m done.” 

He didn’t think through the words before he said them, wasn’t even sure what he meant by them. Done with being fucked with. Done with playing whatever game this was. But everyone in the room seemed to think he meant he was done negotiating.

Steve was on his feet fastest, almost impossibly so, lunging across the room as Rhodey called out “Stop!”, to Steve or to Clint, he wasn’t sure.

So Clint reacted. He twisted.

Time froze, making them subjects in a painting; a carefully arranged tableau. Rhodey was kneeling, unable to rise off the floor without assistance. He was staring, horrified, at Tony, the level demeanor the Colonel nearly always carried with him gone. Sam was standing, being careful not to leave Clint’s line of sight, eyes darting around the room as though looking for a solution.

Steve has his hand a centimeter away from the arm on Tony’s throat, having lunged forward to try and grab Clint before he could finish the deadly move. His eyes are locked on Clint’s, his other hand on Tony’s leg, gripping him just below the knee, ready to tug him to safety if Clint gave him so much as an inch of space.

Clint didn’t let himself acknowledge what Tony was doing. Clint didn’t want to think about Tony right now.

He stared Steve down. “Go on, then.”

Steve’s hand tightened on Tony’s leg, but he didn’t take his eyes off Clint.

“Kill me,” Clint shot at him. “You fucked up. I figured it out. So this is when you wipe me and snap me back to the beginning, right?”

“Clint. Hey.” Sam moved closer, caution in every step.

“No,” Clint cut him off. “I’m done playing. We’re done. I’m done.”

“Don’t make me hurt you,” Steve said, his voice low.

Clint hadn’t broken their staring match. “I’m going to claw my way out and come for every one of you, and the only reason I’ll leave any of you alive is to give you to Natasha, and then you’ll wish it had been me that finished you.”

He was ending this. Either they were going to kill him and prove that he was right - because he had to be right, there were no other options at this point - or he was going to break out of here.

It was back to the overload-their-system plan.

“You’re going to do everything I say,” Clint said, aiming the words mostly at Steve. “You want to prove this is real, right?”

Steve looked uncertain, but nodded.

“I need to leave the workshop.”

“Ok,” Sam took over again. “No one is stopping you from doing that.”

“Tony’s coming with me. Just Tony. Got it?”

“That’s not -” Steve started, but Rhodey cut him off, words weighted with pain.

“Let him, Steve.”

Sam deliberated for half a second, then circled around to Rhodey, helping him into a position that took weight off the braces as Rhodey sighed in relief.

Clint barely registered it. They weren’t his main concern right now. His main concern was the stubborn, half-naked super-soldier who was still far too close for comfort. “Rogers.Either get it over with and kill both of us, or back the hell off.”

It looked like it took all of Steve’s will and self-control to take his hand off Tony’s leg. Even after he backed away, it was the last piece he took with him, prolonging the touch as long as he could, whispering, “I’m sorry.”

“F.R.I.D.A.Y.?” Clint spoke at the ceiling. “Get Banner in here.”

_“Doctor Banner’s presence is not recommended in such a high-intensity situation.”_

Clint almost smirked, wondering if he needed to get out of the workshop for this to work at all. Maybe four hallucinations were all the system could manage at once after all, even if one of those was silent and frozen in his arms right now.

“You have certain protocols to protect Stark, right?”

_“Securing and maintaining Mr Stark’s safety is one of my primary objectives, yes.”_

“Then secure and maintain his safety by getting Banner in here, stat.”

There was silence as F.R.I.D.A.Y. processed the request, finally replying with a reluctant, _“Doctor Banner is on his way.”_

With Steve now at a relatively safer distance, Clint eased up, just a little, rearranging Tony more securely in his lap so Clint could shake out his legs. Wow, they had even remembered to give him pins and needles. He gave them extra credit for effort.

“Rogers,” Clint ordered. “Against the support beam behind you.”

Steve obediently backed against one of the thick pillars throughout the large workshop.

“Ground. Hands.”

Steve slid to the ground, his hands raised.

“Wilson. Take the braces off Rhodes.”

Sam hesitated. “That’s really not necessary.”

“Sam,” Rhodey said quietly. “It’s fine. Just do whatever he says.”

Sam had gotten through one brace and was halfway done with the other when Bruce stumbled through the door of the workshop, looking like he’d been asleep when F.R.I.D.A.Y. had called him. He took in the scene. “Oh, no. I shouldn’t be here.”

“We won’t be long,” Clint said. “Top drawer of the workbench on the left. Open it. Get them.”

“What are you looking for?” Sam pressed, but Clint was done playing negotiation.

Confused and wary, Bruce opened the drawer Clint had indicated, eyes going wide when he saw what was inside. “Clint, I don’t think -”

“Take them out. Put them on Rogers.”

Bruce swallowed as he pulled the set of magnetized cuffs out of the drawer, shooting an uncertain look at Steve. “It’s fine,” Steve assured him. “Clint just needs to go outside, right Clint?”  


Right. Outside. So what if they had figured out how to do multiple people. In all the simulations, Clint had never left Tony’s workshop. If he had to take a guess, it was that whoever had grabbed him wanted something Tony was working on in here, and was hoping that Clint would eventually lead them to it. So there would be no point mapping anything in the simulation outside the workshop, right?

“Put them on,” Clint repeated as Bruce still hovered, unsure.

“Bruce, do it,” Rhodey said quietly. He was sprawled on the ground, keeping himself up by his elbows, keeping his eyes on Tony.

Bruce dropped the restraints twice before he even got to Steve, the captain obediently putting his hands behind the support pillar to let Bruce lock them into place.

“Only Tony can unlock those right? Right?” Clint repeated, addressing the last question at Tony.

There was an awkward silence before Tony answered, barely audible. “Yes.”

The room was so quiet after that that Clint could hear the slight hitch of Steve’s breath as Bruce locked up his hands. “Ankles too,” Clint ordered. “Behind the pillar.”

With some effort and assistance from Bruce, Steve worked his legs so Bruce could bind them as well. It left him hanging forward, limbs pinned, in a position that would have been borderline agony if Steve was, you know, _real._

“Go to the workbench by the cars. Get the zip-ties. Secure Wilson and Rhodes. Two zip-ties each.”

Neither Sam nor Rhodey fought back as Bruce tied their hands around the workbench, lines of nylon snapped over each wrist. Clint’s head was starting to spin, and he started to wonder if there were ramifications of staying in the same simulation this long. Maybe they’d stopped caring. Maybe they were just going to keep him here until his brain fried.

“Come here, bring the zip-ties,” Clint ordered Bruce. The physicist scurried over, eyes darting between Clint and Tony.

“Don’t fuck with me, Stark,” Clint warned, and then he maneuvered himself off the car in one fluid movement, pushing them both forward. His back groaned in complaint, but he ignored it, as he did Tony’s small cry of pain. Clint adjusted them so Tony was no longer flush against his chest. “Put your hands behind your back. Let Bruce tie them. And before either of you try anything, Banner here looks stressed enough without something else going wrong.” Clint looked notably at the three trussed up Avengers. “Probably not a place where you’d want to bring out the Other Guy right now. Not sure these three could get out your way in time if you did.”

That would be interesting; Clint didn’t even know if his captors would be able to manage it. A small part of him was just tempted to trigger it to see what happened, but that survival instinct was too strong. He really didn’t want to know what it would be like to die by Hulk.

Bruce’s eyes went wide with panic as Tony struggled, trying to get his knees underneath himself, growling at Clint. “You’re a bastard, Barton,” Tony snapped at him. “A damn bastard, you know that right?”

“I don’t want to do this,” Clint hissed back at him. “You think I want to tie up and threaten my friends? You think I want to kill them, or have them kill me? Because I don’t. I really fucking don’t. You’re making me, assholes.” _And_ _I’m going to kill you for it when I get out._

“Don’t argue,” Tony cut off Bruce’s next words. “It won’t help.” He stuck out his wrists behind his back and to the side, the position awkward with Clint hanging onto his neck, and shook them at Bruce. “Come on. Let’s take Hunger Games outside and get this over with.”

After Tony was secured came the hardest part, which was why Clint had called Bruce in here. He fixed the scientist with a look. “You’re going to help us stand up. On three. Don’t fuck with me.” _Just stop fucking with me._

Bruce shifted to go behind Clint, but Clint snapped at him, “No. Where I can see you. Grab Tony, help me stand up with him. Ready? One…Two…Three.”

Clint shoved himself off the ground as Bruce hauled Tony to his feet, his hands under the engineer’s armpits. They staggered, Bruce tumbling forward into them before pushing himself away, looking panicked. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to. I wasn’t trying to do anything.”

Clint ignored him. He was going outside, _now._ He was going to watch this whole thing break down. They’d put on a good show, they were _still_ putting on a good show, four pairs of eyes watching him apprehensively. 

“Come,” he shot at Bruce, then dragged Tony to the door. “F.R.I.D.A.Y., open the workshop door and lock it behind us.”

F.R.I.D.A.Y. complied, Bruce trailing them, unsure. “Where do you need to go, Loxley?” Tony said, as though they were going for a leisurely stroll.

“Just move.”

It was slower going than Clint was happy with, having to keep his grip on Tony. Moving slower meant they had more time to build up the world around him, and that’s not what he wanted. He wanted to make the bastards sweat. 

Clint could feel Tony struggling to draw breath again and let up just a fraction to let him breathe unimpeded. That also had the side effect of letting Tony talk again as well. 

“So just to make this clear, we’re going walkabout because there’s no way whoever grabbed you simulated the entire Compound, right?”

“They always kept him the workshop,” Bruce chimed in, trying to match Clint’s pace without getting close enough to spook him.

“So someone has enough access to my workshop enough to create _The Sims_ version in Barton’s head? That’s not comforting in any way.”

“ _Had_ enough access,” Bruce corrected him. “They’re all dead. Clint, they’re all dead, you’re not there, just _stop.”_

Clint halted at the end of the corridor, debating where to go next. Bruce nearly collided with him, and quickly took two steps back.

“Armory,” Tony stated.

“What?”

“Armory,” Tony repeated. “Most complex room in the Compound. You want to prove this is real? Let’s go there.”

They did. And the armory looked exactly as Clint remembered it.

Every weapon Tony could come up with or New S.H.I.E.L.D. could provide lined the racks on the walls. Clint spun them both around, almost knocking Tony off balance as he scanned them. They were here. They were all here. They hadn’t missed one.

“See?” Tony pressed. “Everything’s here. Ok? You think they took all this out of your head?”

“Maybe. Yes.”

He was eyeing the rows of guns, considering, and Bruce seemed to read his mind because he said, “Tony? Was coming to a room full of guns the best idea?”

“I have nothing but good ideas,” Tony was halfway through saying when F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s voice rang out over the intercom, at a lower volume than usual. As though she was trying very hard not to make Clint jump.

_“Boss? You may wish to know that Mr Parker is headed to the armory.”_

Any sense of calm from Tony, fake or not, vanished. “Tell him to head the other way. F.R.I.D.A.Y.Don’t you let him near this.”

_“I have already advised Mr Parker to return to his quarters. Several times.”_  


Tony swore as he suddenly attempted a move that might have gotten out of a less trained spy’s grip. Clint clung on. “Clint, listen. We get it, ok? All of us have been to some not-so-pretty places in our so-called superhero heads. I get you’re there now - all of us do. We’re not mad. I’m not mad. You get a free pass for all of us. But that free pass goes away the second Peter steps in this room, you get that?” Tony started struggling in earnest before Clint whipped him around to face Bruce who froze, one hand reaching towards one of the guns on the table.

“What are you going to do, Banner? Shoot me?”

“I mean, I’d really rather not.”

“Hands off.”

Bruce backed away, hands in the air.

_“Mr Parker is approximately sixty seconds away, Boss.”_

“Don’t, Clint. _Don’t.”_

Clint let out a breath, the image of dead Cooper stabbing back into his head. “F.R.I.D.A.Y.? Have Peter turn around.”

_“I have conveyed that message to him. He doesn’t appear to be following it.”_

Tony swore as light footsteps barrelled towards the door, and then a scruffy-haired teenager who looked liked he’d just woken up appeared in the door, web-shooters in hand.“Mr Stark? I fell asleep in my workshop and then my spidey-sense went off, like real bad, and I know F.R.I.D.A.Y. kept telling me to turn around but then I knew that something definitely must be going on so _ohmygod._ ”

Peter froze in the doorway to the armory, web-shooter raised. But there wasn’t a gun or a knife Peter could pull out of Clint’s hands. Clint was the weapon.

“Mr Stark?” Peter asked, unsure, and…

And this Peter was different from the other simulated ones. The others had been clearly false, the eyes too big, the face too innocent, playing younger than the sixteen-year-old he had come to know. This Peter was nervous, yes, eyes on his captive mentor, but there was a resoluteness to the stance that hadn’t been there before, assessing the situation, looking for options.

“We’re fine, Pete,” Tony said. “Clint and I are just working through some stuff. You know how he had his brain messed with by those people last week?”

Peter cottoned on. “Oh. _Oh._ Can I…How can I help?”

“No,” Clint whispered, eyes on Peter. “You’re…how are you _here?”_

“My spidey-sense told me something was wrong so-”

“No,” Clint said again. “No, this is fake. This has to be fake.”

Bruce stepped forward, palms tilted upwards. “It’s real, Clint. We’re your friends. We just want to help, ok?”

“Yeah,” Peter chimed in, all earnestness. “I’m here to help too.”

Air. He needed air.

“Ok, let’s get some air,” Tony said. Had he said that last part out loud? “Why don’t you let Peter and Bruce go back to the workshop and untie the others and we can sort the rest out, just us?”  


“No,” Clint said quickly. “Not…not yet.”

“Ok,” Tony said, and Clint could tell he was forcing calm again. “Just…there can be a couple of complications if Rhodey’s left out of the braces in a stress position for too long. And you also left -Well, Steve’s not exactly strapped into the most comfortable position either right now.”

Tony flinched as Clint shifted his hold on him, only to relax again as Clint buried his head in the back of Tony’s shoulder, breathing in the scent of sweat and coffee and motor oil. Had he been able to smell anything in the simulations? He didn’t think so. He couldn’t remember.

“Clint…” Bruce had taken a tiny step forward and, emboldened when Clint didn’t make a move, crossed the room and laid a tentative hand on Clint’s shoulder. “It’s ok. You went through a lot. No one is mad. Right, Tony?”

“Peter,” Clint got out.  


“I know,” he heard Tony say. “But him being here is his fault, not yours.” His next words were directed at the teenager. "Something we’ll be having words about later.”

Peter started to protest. “Mr Stark -”

“Many, many words.”

Another silence fell, even as Clint could hear Tony’s shallow breathing, could hear Peter shuffle nervously in the doorway.

“Clint,” Bruce said softly. “You’re safe. You can let go of Tony.”

Clint’s arms tightened instinctively instead. He wanted to let go. He wanted this to be over, to acknowledge he was home, that he was no longer a prisoner, that there was no one in his head. That he really was safe.

But every survival instinct he had gathered over decades of circus work and living on the streets and S.H.I.E.L.D. missions were still burning hot, and it refused to let him release the last piece of insurance he had.

“I understand,” Tony said softly. “You can let go when you’re ready. I know you’re not going to hurt me. I trust you.”

Clint nodded against Tony’s shoulder.

“But you need to let the others go.” Tony finished. “At least untie Rhodey, ok?”

Clint’s fingers dug into Tony’s skin before he realized what he was doing and loosened them again. “Ok.”  


About two-thirds of the tension went out of Tony. “Ok. Peter, go with Bruce to my workshop. It’s not exactly a party down there, but you’ll find Cap in some cuffs that you should be able to break him out of.”

“What about you?”

“I’m fine, alright? I need you to trust me, kid.”

Bruce was still by Clint’s side, gently rubbing circles on his arm. “Tony…are you sure?”

“Yep,” Tony announced, sounding genuine. “One hundred percent. You and spiderboy are on free-the-calvary duty. Barton and I are going to get some lovely fresh air. Needed a break from the workshop anyway.”  


Bruce let out a forced laugh. “This is what takes for you to admit you need a break?”

Clint could feel Tony’s trapped hands strain, trying to give his shoulders some relief. “Them or us first, Hawk Day Afternoon?”

“Us,” Clint replied immediately. “Don’t follow.”

“They won’t. Tell him you won’t.”  


Both Peter and Bruce hesitated, but at Tony’s prompting agreed to let Clint drag Tony out of the armory first, pulling him towards the elevator.

The elevator was almost eerily quiet, just the sounds of them both breathing and the whirring machinery as it catapulted them up to the roof. Tony seemed like he was going to keep good on his promise to wait until Clint was ready to let him go, so Clint relaxed his hold a little, and Tony pulled in several full breaths as they were rocketed upwards.

When the elevator doors opened, Clint took in the first breath of air he felt like he’d taken in years. The air was sweet with the scents of freshly cut grass, someone having just taken care of the lawns several stories below them. It tasted fresh and clean and free.

“Do you want to sit?” Tony asked when the elevator doors had closed behind them, leaving them alone on the roof. “Or talk?”

Clint shook his head so Tony could feel it.

“Ok. That’s ok. When you’re ready.”  


Clint wanted to be ready. He really did. A small part of him wished that this was a simulation after all, that he could throw them both off the roof and restart, make it so this day had never happened.

“It’s ok,” Tony said again, the quiet voice he reserved for very few people, the side of him most people didn’t get to see, the side of him he would deny in a heartbeat if you ever pointed it out to him. _It’s ok. Let go. I’ll take care of you._

Clint's arms were just slackening around Tony’s throat when the elevator doors opened behind him.

Clint knew it was Natasha. He always knew. Knew the way he hadn’t in the simulations, had felt her wrongness the seconds those bastards had thrown her likeness in front of him.

“Clint. Look at me.”

It sounded like her. Every intonation, every inflection in those four words was true.

“Look at me.”

He couldn’t. It would be the last nail in the hallucinogenic coffin. If Natasha was real, then all of this was real. Everything Clint had done to his friends was real.

_“Clint.”_

No. No, it wasn’t her. Clint couldn’t have the last beacon of hope that today hadn’t been real extinguished just yet. She was blocking his only exit, so he made his way to the edge of the roof instead, drawing out a surprised curse from Tony that he resolutely ignored.

A gunshot rang out that didn’t make him stop. Neither did the second one. He only stopped when he was on the very edge of the Compound roof, gazing out over the long drop below, nowhere else to go.

“I will shoot you in the damn foot, Clint Barton. Turn around.”

And if that wasn’t Natasha, Clint didn’t know what was. He turned.

Natasha was still dressed in a hospital gown, paired with a set of combat boots and her mission jacket, out of breath but resolute. She raised the gun. “You’re not going to make me shoot Stark in the leg, are you?

“Yeah, as much as I love _Speed,_ no thanks,” Tony called across the roof. “Actually, Barton was just on his way to letting me go _without_ any pieces of metal entering my body. Right, Clint?”

Clint’s breaths were coming faster as he locked eyes with his closest friend. “Tasha.”

She softened, just fractionally, in a way no one but Clint would notice. “I’m here. You’re ok.”

“Everyone…” Clint swallowed, trying to find his voice. “Everyone else?”

“They’re ok too,” Natasha assured him. “No one is going to hold this against you.”

“Tell me about Budapest.”

A hint of a smile flickered across her lips. “Always. But let Tony go first.”

Clint was moving before his brain had caught up with his body, shifting them both so they on the very precipice of the building, causing a sharp inhale from Tony as his toes hung over open air. “Tell me about Budapest. _Now._ ”

“Ok,” Natasha said. “I was fresh out of the Red Room, running missions for the KGB. You’d been sent by Fury to take me out of the picture. You made a different call.”

“And?”

“And my handlers weren’t happy. They came after me. They came after me through you.”

“And?” 

“And so I killed them all.”

Clint let out a long breath. Thank god. Thank _god._

He threw Tony off the roof.

The pain exploded in his leg a moment later, and he was stumbling before strong hands were grabbing his shirt, yanking him back before he could fall. They weren’t gentle, slamming him into the roof as Clint lay on his back, blood gushing from the wound on his leg as Natasha pinned him down, laughing his head off.

There were tears in Natasha's eyes but she was fighting them back, fisting a hand in Clint’s shirt to haul him halfway upright. “You idiot. You _idiot_. What the hell did you just do?”

Her face was out of focus, Clint was laughing so hard. Then he felt the wetness on his cheeks and realized it might not be laughter after all. “ _I’m_ the idiot? I can’t believe you fell for that.”

Natasha went still, unsure, as Clint sucked in air, trying to breathe past the pain of the gunshot. “You asked me about Budapest. I told you about Budapest.”

Clint met her gaze, his grin all bared teeth. “You told me what’s on the official S.H.I.E.L.D. files. They wouldn’t have been hard to find after Nat pulled her little Wikileaks stunt in 2014. You want to know the real Budapest story while I bleed out on this excuse for a fake Compound?”

He forced himself upright, ignoring the pain, so he was talking right in the simulated Natasha’s face. “There’s no Budapest. There never _was_ any Budapest. It’s a stupid joke we made up that lasted for longer than it had any right to. And the real Natasha would know that.”

Natasha stared down at him in anger before she sighed, defeated. “Damn. I really thought we had you this time.”

Clint still wasn’t sure if he was laughing or crying as Natasha put the gun to his head and pulled the trigger.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously, on the Whumptoberverse...(AKA previous plot points to keep in mind for this chapter to make sense.)
> 
> 1) Natasha was severely injured in a fire at Avengers Towers, which included losing most of her hair and burns around the face.  
> 2) Wanda chose not to sign the Accords when a plea bargain was offered for the rogues. Vision then essentially faked his death and went to join her.  
> 3) In 'Room 101', Clint earned himself a regular doctor in Ali Hara, who was working with him through past traumas that restraints and drugs trigger.
> 
> My unending thanks to Fluencca and usa123 for beta reading this monster of a chapter. You guys are literally the best :)

He was lying on something soft

Movement. Busy, hurried. A beeping - too loud. The air smelled clean, all chemicals and fabric softener, mixed in with worn leather and strawberry body wash.

_Home._

“Tasha?”

“Sh, I’m here. We got you out. You’re safe now.”

_Out?_

“Where -”

“You’re in the med bay. A little messed up, but you’re going to be fine.”

_A little messed up?_

He was _always_ a little messed up, from a mission or training exercise or from old injuries that never quite faded. A twinge in the knee. A pop in his ankle. This wasn’t that. “I don’t remember...”

“You were unconscious when we found you, hooked up to some machine. Tony’s pulling it apart now. He’ll figure it how it works - he always does.”

_Tony…_

“Can you open your eyes?”

_Tony. Falling._

_“_ Clint?”

_A purple cup._

“Look at me.”

_Cooper’s corpse. Steve caving his skull in. Natasha’s gun to his head._

“You’re safe now.”

_Budapest._

He forced his eyes open, wincing at the bright lights overhead, only to have them blocked out by a familiar face. “Hi.”

“Hi.” His voice was a stranger’s, low and hoarse. He tried to blink away the fog in his head, wincing at the dull ache behind his eyes that only intensified as he tried and failed to sit up.

“Here.” Natasha leaned around him, propping him up against the pillows as someone touched his wrist. He flinched away. “It’s ok,” Natasha reassured him. “It’s just Dr. Hara. You remember Ali, don’t you?”

Clint titled his head sideways as the doctor’s face came into focus, assessing him with a warm smile. “Agent Barton. I’d say nice to see you again, but I think we have the kind of relationship where the less we see of each other, the better.”

Another jolt of discomfort through his skull. Then another. He winced, pressing his hand to his forehead as though he could force the pain back inside and lock it away.

“That should stop soon,” Hara assured him. “We’re mostly keeping you here for monitoring. Once we get some fluids in you, you should be fine. Agent Romanoff okayed the first round of painkillers and I recommend you continue them, but you can choose if you want the second dosage in an hour or so.”

Natasha was on his left, still half-dressed in mission clothes that clashed with the bandages around her head and jaw that had been a mainstay since the Tower fire. 

“She’s meant to be on bed rest,” Hara interjected when they saw what Clint was looking at, but there was no real disapproval in the reproach.

Natasha shrugged them off, still focussed on Clint. “You didn’t really think I wouldn’t come get you, did you?”

Clint didn’t respond, taking in the rest of the room instead. Natasha to his left. Hara to his right. A nurse hovered near the base of the bed, busying himself with a clipboard of notes.

Hara gestured to the nurse. “You remember Fahd?”

Fahd looked up with a smile. “It’s ok if you don’t. Ali’s the memorable one in this relationship.”

Hara gave him a good-natured smack on the arm. “Don’t sell yourself short. Is it ok if I take your blood pressure now, Agent Barton?”

Clint looked from them, to Fahd, to the door. “Maybe first…” He looked back at Natasha. “Thirsty?”

“You can give him that.” Fahd gestured to the water cup behind Clint’s bed, but Natasha responded with a knowing smile.

“Vanilla coke or cherry?”

“Cherry.”

“You’re disgusting,” she replied, as per their usual bedside ritual. The words came with a reassuring smile and a squeeze. A reward for behaving. “And now you owe me a Fanta.”

Clint counted her steps away from the bed as Hara held up the cuff. “Ok?”

Five steps. Ten steps. Fifteen…

“Agent Barton?”

Natasha left the room, shutting the door behind her. Clint let out the breath he’d been holding. He was sure they’d just sent her back in, but having her out of the room to begin with would give him a headstart. 

Clint turned back to Hara. “You didn’t really think I would fall for this, would you?” Then he lunged for them.

Hara was unmoving on the ground before they had registered what Clint was doing. Fahd wasn’t so lucky, eyes going huge as he tried to scramble away from Clint, slamming a button on the wall a split second before Clint’s hands were twisting his throat too.

Two down. Footsteps in the hallway. Many more to go.

Plan. He needed a plan.

_Overload the machine._

Right. That was the plan.

He was expecting them to throw his teammates at him again - falsified versions of friends that grew increasingly uncanny with every new simulation - to kill or be killed by. So he was thrown when three security guards burst through the door instead. At least they hadn’t given them faces he knew, and that was going to make this easier.

His captors hadn’t been in the habit of _easier._ If they were still trying to convince him this was real, he wasn’t going to let them. He wasn’t going to entertain that doubt again, not for a second.

The guards came at him with stun guns which he dodged, brain catching up to the movement as more necks broke. These were simulations. They could have given them better weapons than this. He congratulated them for their commitment to the bit.

He grabbed the last guard, reaching for his stun gun. Screw trying to get them to map out the whole Compound. He’d find a car, he’d go into the city, because there was no way whoever had grabbed him had the processing power to simulate all of New York. That, or they’d reboot him and he’d do this all again, and again and again until he beat them.

He was going to break the machine. He was going to get out. He was going to go home.

It was the last coherent idea in his head as an electrical shock gripped him from behind. His final thought before he collapsed into unconsciousness was that, for a simulation, Natasha’s Widow Bite felt very, very real.

***

_There were hands on him._

_“Sh, it’s ok. You’re going to be ok.”_

_Comforting words that were never a comfort._

_Clint strained against the straps holding him down as he tried to spit out the ring that kept words from forming. The hand swept over his forehead, too large, too warm, not so much wiping dirt and sweat away as pushing it from skin to hair. “It only hurts in the beginning.”_

_Liar. It hurt all the way through, every second of it._

_He must have sensed Clint’s resistance because the hand in his hair tightened, pulling him back against the bed until he cried out from the pain of it. The sound ejected a gob of drool down his chin he couldn’t wipe away._

_Duquesne tsked at him as he withdrew a handkerchief from his pocket to clean him up. “Messy.”_

_Clint moaned and squirmed under the restraints until he felt a strong hand around his chin jerking his head to the side, making him look into the man’s face as he said, “Just think of it like a game, ok? Boys your age like games, Clinton. And when you learn to behave, we won’t have to make you behave.”_

_Pain in his arm. A needle. Cold, dark, then -_

***

There were hands on him.

Rough, clinical, urgent hands; too many, too foreign. He went to bat them away, only to be met with a firm resistance as his arms jerked but didn’t move. Sensation was flooding back, putting his brain in a meat tenderizer and making him aware of the leather straps covering him from head to toe.

He jerked on them, snarling when he felt the prick of a needle in his arm and feeling as he did so the sensation of metal on teeth, keeping them open. He shoved his tongue against it on instinct, trying to force the intrusion out of his mouth, but it was stuck fast so he spat and struggled and writhed instead as a heaviness pressed down on him and -

***

There were hands on him. Not gentle. Nails digging into skin.

“Clint.”

(Voice known. Safe.)

“Clint. _Please,_ I don’t have long.”

(Voice…scared? Incorrect. Shouldn’t be -)

“Just one more minute.”

Other voices.

(Angry. Unknown. Not safe.)

“I have to go away for a while.”

(Don’t go.)

“But I’ll come back. I’ll _always_ come for you.”

_Worn leather. Strawberries._

(Last chance.)

“Budapest. Nat, tell me…”

“Our joke. Just for us. And for Phil. A game no one could play but us.”

(Anger. Impatience. Getting closer.)

“I need to go now.”

(Falling?)

“But I’ll come for you. I _need_ you to believe me, ok? I’ll come.”

(Falling.)

***

_“Barney -”_

_“Don’t.”_

_“I don’t want to.”_

_“Be grateful. They look after us. And that doesn’t come free. No one is ever going to help either of us without something in return.”_

_“Don’t go! Come back, Barney, please, come -”_

***

(Voices. People. Movement.)

“You can’t be in here.”

(Unknown voice.)

“And you can’t _do_ this.”

(Voice known. Voice safe?)

“Escort yourself from the premises or you will be escorted.”

“It’s _my_ goddamn building.”

“And it was my goddamn staff! _Five people,_ Stark.”

(Loud)

“He didn’t mean to -”

“No one _accidentally_ kills -”

“And stop shoving that shit into his blood before-”

(Loud Loud LOUD)

***

(Quiet)

***

The room was white.

He wasn’t in the med bay.

He recognized the place all the same.

***

There were no hands on him.

There was something in his arm. He went to fumble for it, only to be met with resistance. Cuffs. Wrists, ankles. A strap across his chest. He yanked on them, some part of his brain noting that they were soft inside, not rough. Not Duquesne.

But restraints he knew nonetheless. 

Something brushed his arm. He jerked away instinctively, making the touch vanish in the same breath, willing the world to come into focus. “It’s just me.”

(Voice known).

“Do you want to sit up?”

Yeah, that sounded great right about now. He tugged on the cuffs as a ‘yes.’

“I can’t take those off.”

(Guilt. Not anger. Safe.)

“But here, I can…”

Clint shut his eyes again as the bed jolted, fighting nausea as the top half folded upright, propping him into a sitting position.

“Are you going to throw up?”

(Assessing.)

“Clint? Are you going to vomit? You’re on…um, you’re some pretty heavy mediation. They said you might.”

(Assessed.)

“No.” His tongue felt like cotton.

“Ok. But I have a bowl here if you need one.”

Clint pulled on the cuffs again in answer. “Off.”

“I can’t.”

“I’m not _crazy.”_

(False? Unsure.)

“I’m sorry.”

Clint forced his eyes open, ignoring the pain the bright lights ignited in his head. “Get me out.”

He had never seen Steve look so tired. “I can’t-”

“You _can.”_

(Can’t stay here. Unsafe.)

He pulled on the cuffs. “Off. Off, now, I’m done, let me _out -”_

(Movement. New people? Unsafe.)

A comforting touch that was knocked away. “You’re going to be ok, just hold on, ok? You’re going to be ok.”

(False.)

***

“Lighten the medication. This isn’t necessary.”

“We are treating a dangerous patient, Dr Banner. It’s our right to protect ourselves by sedating -”

“He’s not dangerous. He was just disorientated, and you can hardly blame him for -“

“Disorientated people don’t just kill _five people._ The medication stays as it is.”

***

Five people.

***

Tony was next. Tony Stark wore guilt like a king’s cape if you knew to look for it. It weighed him down in the visitor's chair as he fussed with Clint’s charts.

“I threw you off a roof,” Clint told him.

He was already falling back into sleep, and was only half-sure he heard Tony’s reply of, “Yeah, I probably deserve about that.”

***

_“It’s just a game, Clinton. Remember? The less you struggle the less it hurts. You work for me now."_

_A bus leaving in the rain, taking the poor excuse for a family he’d known with it. He’d chased it anyway. Sometimes he hoped Barney had seen._

_But Barney was gone._

_“Give in, Clinton. No one is coming for you.”_

***

Budapest.

_Our joke. Just for us. And for Phil. A game no one could play but us._

***

His head was clear.

He blinked his eyes open, the lights a little less harsh than before, the smells less invasive. 

A blurry form on his left turned into Bruce. The physicist put aside the tablet he had been pouring over, hastily readjusting his glasses. “You’re awake.”

Clint gave an experimental tug. The cuffs hadn’t vanished along with the fog that had been clouding his mind for… “How long?”

“Six days.”

Clint gave another tug. “Can you -”

“I’m sorry. We have to play by the rules for now. They’re going to make it worse if we don’t.”

He grimaced, sinking back into the pillows.

“How are you feeling?”

Clint assessed. “Clear,” he settled on, before realizing that didn’t make sense. “Like my brain is…active. Or...”

“That’s good,” Bruce rescued him. “You’ve been on some pretty heavy stuff, but the psychologists decided you were coming back to yourself enough to lighten your dosage. Or it might be more accurate to say that I may have implied a Hulk-out would happen if they didn’t. Don’t tell anyone.”

Clint ignored him, focussing in on the IV drip inserted into his arm instead. “What’s in that?”

Bruce winced. “I convinced them to let up a bit, but they’re not up for taking you off the sedative altogether. I’m sorry - I know drugs aren’t your favorite. Or hospitals. But you did...you know.”

“Yeah,” Clint muttered, remembering the last time he’d been tied to a bed, having his side stitched up by -

There was a clatter as Bruce’s tablet hit the floor, the scientist lunging for a basin. The spray of vomit was followed quickly by a second, Bruce awkwardly craning his arm around Clint’s shoulders to keep him bent forward as his stomach upended itself.

They stayed like that for some time, Clint half aware of Bruce murmuring a, “It’s fine, I’ve got it” which he didn’t think was aimed at him. Finally, long after there was anything to bring up, his guts decided to call it quits and Bruce was free to step back from the bed, adjusting the angle so Clint could sit upright.

He was a mess and he knew it, giving the cuffs a half-hearted pull as he closed his eyes. They would come off. They _had_ to come off.

“Hara,” he croaked. “God, Bruce, I didn’t mean-”

That was as far as he got before something cold and metal was being pressed against his lips.

Clint flinched away with a hiss, getting nothing but a dull ache in his limbs in return.

“It’s water,” Bruce said quickly. “To help you, um, rinse out your mouth a bit.”

“Can’t you just...just one hand, even?”

He already knew the answer, long before Bruce said it. “It’s better to just behave for now, alright? All of us. You need to prove to them you can. Do you understand?”

“I -”

“Five people are dead, Clint.” The words weren’t harsh. Just sad.

It took him a second, but finally he nodded and let Bruce guide a metal straw between his lips before running a towel over his mouth. The nurse who had been in the room must have taken away the basin because when he dared to breathe again, the smell of vomit wasn’t as strong as he was expecting.

“I thought I was still in there,” he got out, before realizing that Bruce probably had no idea what he was talking about. “They kept making me think it was real. They -”

“We know,” Bruce said quickly. “Tony pulled that machine apart and then some for the defense Maria and Pepper are going to present to the Committee.”

“Defence?”

“He’s been working non-stop to get you both out, we all are. It’s just going to take some patience, ok?

_To get you both out._

“Bruce. Where’s Nat?”

Bruce winced as he placed the towel aside. “No one who matters is saying anything was her fault.”

Clint tensed in the cuffs. “She stopped me. She didn’t have anything to do with it.”

“We know that, but...”

“What did they do to her?”

“But the Committee thinks she could have acted faster. That she could have stopped…that she could have prevented more of the damage.”

_“Where is she?”_

“The Raft. They took her to the Raft.”

***

He wished they would turn out the lights.

***

“Agent Barton, can you describe your environment for me?”

“S.H.I.E.L.D. psych ward.”

“Very good. And do you believe this psych ward is real or simulated?”

***

Pepper Potts did not belong in a padded room.

His head was finally close to being something like normal, even though there was still something being pumped into him via the IV that he couldn’t remove. The drugs were giving the CEO of Stark Industries a haze-halo as she consulted him over a Starkpad.

“I’m just getting your side of the story,” she had told him. “Are you ok if I record it?”

“What for?”

“The lawyers. We have the whole team working on this. We’re going to get you and Natasha out, ok?”

 _Out._ He wanted out so badly.

“It wasn’t her fault.”

“No, it wasn’t,” Pepper agreed. “Or yours. The play is to plead temporary insanity.”

“I’m not _insane.”_

Her reply was gentle. “They’re still not sure if you think the environment you’re in is real or not.”

_Budapest._

“I know what’s real.”

Pepper fiddled with her tablet. “I need as many details from you as we can. You said they put you through multiple simulations? Do you remember how many?”

“No. But a lot.”

“And they’d restart them? When?”

“When I figured out it was a simulation.”

“And how did they know that?”

“They’d know.”

“And what would happen then?”

“They’d kill me. And when they didn’t, and I’d want out, before they could get to me I’d kill someone in the room. To prove that I knew.”

_Tony. Falling._

“Once they were sure they couldn’t convince me it was real anymore, we’d go right back to the beginning. And I’d try again. I thought, maybe, if I got through enough of them, I’d get out for good.”

Pepper laid a gentle hand on his. “You did get through enough of them. You’re out now.”

Clint’s answer was to pull on the cuffs.

***

The ceiling had 587 holes in it. Clint had counted them forty-three times.

_I’ll come for you._

But Natasha wasn’t coming. And he was done waiting.

He was getting out of this damn bed.

***

Coming off the heavier medication meant he could have more regular visitors, and Clint tore apart every opening they gave him.

Tony treated the visits like any other hangout they had had back in his workshop, teasing and needling and trying to make Clint join in, even though he couldn’t stop his eyes flashing every so often to the restraints. Every time he did, Clint would drop the role of surly patient and bring out pleading captive instead. He aimed right for every sensitive and sore spot he knew Tony had, including the fresh wound of Tony’s tech landing him and Natasha in this position in the first place. Tony would eventually make his excuses to leave the room, his visits turning from infrequent to non-existent. 

Bruce’s immunity to his tricks was stronger, but Clint played him anyway. Bruce knew better than any of them what it was like to fear captivity, to fear helplessness, to have your body at the mercy of someone else. At least Bruce didn’t duck the subject; just ran through the long list of Clint’s symptoms, of recommended treatments, and promised that this wasn’t permanent. 

He quickly figured out that Sam was a no-go. Whenever he’d try, the pararescue would slip into his VA persona, ignoring all of Clint’s sneering at his attempts at therapizing him. Sam tried to replace that approach with their usual banter, but that only served to irritate Clint further. With nowhere else for Sam to turn their conversation, every visit ended with them lapsing into awkward silence.

Steve tried to read to him. He was three sentences into the first book when Clint hurled every expletive he knew and then some his way. Steve didn’t try it again.

Rhodey was bulletproof to any and all of Clint’s pleas or demands, but also turned out to the visitor that Clint could tolerate the longest. The colonel at least acknowledged Clint’s situation, and answered his questions, and did it all without an ounce of pity. It took Clint longer than he’d admit to pick up that the attitude was most likely constructed from years of handling a teenage Tony Stark through moods and hangovers and every self-destructive tendency in the handbook. His goodwill towards his most tolerable visitor crumbled with that revelation. After that, there was nothing Rhodey could do to coax him out of a silent sulk whenever he stepped in the room.

Bucky didn’t come at all, and Clint didn’t know if he was hurt or relieved until he remembered that Bucky was almost as much a prisoner as he was. It wouldn’t make sense for him to be here. And the more days and visiting hours passed, the more Clint sunk into the knowledge that he might not see Bucky again for a long, long time.

***

“Agent Barton, can you describe your environment for me?”

“White.”

“And?”

“More white. Jesus, get a plant in here or something.”

“Do you think your environment is real or simulated?”

“I think you can bite me.”

***

“Well, at least we’re not starting from the beginning every time now,” Pepper assured him. “Only forward from here.”

“Sure.” He shuffled as best he could on the bed.

“We’re making progress,” she pressed. “The Committee will come around, if only to prevent another three hour Tony-lecture about the technology they used on you.”

“The mindfucker machine.”

Pepper allowed herself a small smile. “Sure. The mindfucker machine.”

He snorted a little at hearing the expletive in her mouth, but didn’t have the heart to snap at her for humoring him.

“Could you see any of it?” he asked her, then clarified. “What they were putting in my head. When Tony tore apart the machine, could he see…”

Pepper shook her head. “No. He couldn’t.”

“I knew it was real.” He didn’t know why he was bothering, except the need to justify out loud why he threw the most important person in Pepper Potts’s life off a roof. Even if it hadn’t been real. It had known it wasn’t really Tony. He _had._

“We know,” Pepper said softly. “At least, we know that you didn’t give them anything important.”

_You have a secret farmhouse that no one but us-_

“They wanted Tony’s tech,” Clint clarified.

“Yes,” Pepper answered. “But you didn’t give it to them, and they’re in custody now. It’s in the past.”

“Is anyone going to tell me who _they_ are?”

Pepper pursed her lips. “The legal team say the less you know the better. But you don’t need to worry about them anymore, alright? And for the record, Tony is sorry, even if he hasn’t told you directly.”

“He doesn’t need to,” Clint mumbled, trying to shuffle down the bed. The straps weren’t tight or uncomfortable, but there were times he felt like they had spread around his throat, cutting off air. “I knew it was real,” he insisted again. “Even in the last one.”

Pepper frowned a little. “The last one?”

“They put more details in the last one. Pulled out all the stops to convince me. But I knew.”

“How?”

“Natasha. I knew.” He pulled on the cuffs when he said her name. It had become a reflex.

Pepper started to fold away the Starkpad. “I’d stay longer, but I’m meeting with the legal team in ten minutes and making sure those very expensive noses are staying to their grindstones. We have the best there is, Clint. They’re going to get you out.”

He almost didn’t want to ask the next part, knowing it was going to sound desperate however he phrased it, but he needed to know. “How much longer?”

Her answer was to lean over him and plant a kiss against his cheek. The action should have been strange, because she was Tony’s Laura, but it didn’t. And they were the same age, so it shouldn’t have felt motherly, but it did. “It might be a while, but hang on. We’re doing everything we can think of.”

***

He couldn’t sleep with the lights blaring at him. It made it hard to keep track of time, but he thought it might have been two weeks now.

_I’ll come. I’ll always come for you._

Words a small part of him still wanted to believe. Words he could no longer afford to trust. He was on his own.

If he could just get the cuffs off, even for a _second…_

He could get them off. He _had_ to get them off. He just needed to up his game.

***

“This is your fault.”

He threw the accusation out of nowhere, aiming for maximum damage. 

Tony didn’t even rise to it. “Yep.”

“You always cared about your stupid tech more than your team.”

Tony glared at him, but there was no heat in it. “I develop my tech to _protect_ this team. Even if it doesn’t always…” He ran a hand through his hair. Strands of gray were starting to show. “I’m going to fix this. Just, soon. I _will.”_

Clint bit down on his lip. Right. Tony: long game. Wrong target.

***

“You rebelled against the whole fucking government for your old army buddy and it got our asses landed in prison.”

Steve almost dropped the book he had been reading. Clint had been lying in deliberate silence since the visit had begun, sharpening his tongue for the blow.

“And we did that gladly. For him. For you.”

Steve slowly closed the book, laying it to one side. “Clint -”

“So repay the favor and get me out of here, _Cap.”_

“I can’t. I’m so sorry, I really am. But it’s better if we do this legally.”

“I don’t want apologies,” Clint snapped back at him. Clint had been vocal about hating Steve’s visits the most. He didn’t know if that was true. Sometimes it just felt good to lash out at someone. “And you were fine not doing a single thing by the book when it was _him,_ but when it’s any of your so-called new friends -”

“You _are_ my friend.”

“Then take the cuffs off.”

“I _can’t,”_ Steve repeated, desperation creeping into his tone. “They’ll make things worse for you if I do. Natasha as well. It’s complicated.”

“It’s not,” Clint snapped back at him.

“Five people are dead,” was Steve’s answer, his voice low.

Clint ignored him. “If you cared, you’d get me out. But you _don’t.”_

He went to war with the cuffs again, causing Steve to throw himself forward and put his hands on Clint’s shoulders, holding him back. “Clint, stop, you’ll hurt yourself.”

“Get off me!”

“Stop or I’ll have to call someone in here.”

Clint stopped, breathing hard, leaving them locked in a kind of weird embrace on the bed. “You don’t care. None of you do.”

Steve looked visually pained as he denied it and Clint remembered that, yeah, he did hate Steve’s visits the most after all.

***

“This is real.”

He couldn’t remember the name of the doctor sitting to his right. He was holding a clipboard, asking questions that Clint wasn’t listening to. There was only one answer they wanted to hear.

“This is real. I’m real. I’m not in a simulation.” He jerked the cuffs. For all his fighting them, he hadn’t gained a millimeter of give since his first day.

The doctor didn’t even glance up. “I don’t believe you, Agent Barton.”

“Why?”

“And if I don’t believe you, how do I know you’re not going to kill someone else the second we let you out of that bed?”

***

Three weeks.

***

“I just want to walk around the room. You know what that's like. ”

It was the dirtiest play he’d tried so far, and he was beyond caring, even if he didn’t really expect Rhodey to rise to it. “We’re doing everything we can to -”

“You’re not,” Clint snarled at him. “You’re not, or I wouldn’t be stuck in here.”

“We are,” Rhodey insisted. “Everyone is doing everything they can -”

 _“You’re_ not,” Clint emphasized. “I’m not asking to climb the Empire State Building. I just want to move around the room, to feed myself, to piss somewhere that isn’t my bed. Is that so much to ask? Or does it make you feel better to watch someone else finally have it worse off than you?”

The frustration from that was real, even if the venom wasn’t. He couldn’t move, couldn’t eat, couldn’t wash himself, couldn’t do anything without their assistance. They’d infantilized him.

_Mistake._

He’d make them pay in the end.

***

He planned.

***

“What if I confessed?”

Maria’s head snapped up from the reports she’d been pouring over. “Confessed?”

“I murdered five people. There, confession.”

“It’s more complicated than that and you know it.”

“I did it,” he snapped. “I did it, I killed them. So send me to the Raft, whatever, _just let me out of the bed.”_

Maria set the reports to one side, drawing the chair closer. “If you do that, they’re going to send you there for good. Right now, temporary insanity is still your best defense.”

“And what’s Nat’s best defense? She didn’t even do anything.”

“We know that.” The calm tone of voice was more maddening than if she had snapped. “And you giving up is not what’s best for her. Or your family - the Raft doesn’t exactly have visiting hours.”

“Stop.” The defiance turned to pleading in a single word. If he thought about them, he wasn’t getting through this. He’d been able to compartmentalize father from agent the second Laura had suggested their firstborn be named Cooper. The two never mixed, the Ultron stopover being the closest. He couldn’t have one identity taint the other without both of them imploding. He didn’t know what would be left of him if that happened.

“Ok,” Maria agreed. “We won’t talk about them. And I can’t...I can’t guarantee that there aren’t going to be some long term consequences. But, Clint? We’re going to figure this out. I promise.”

***

“This is real.”

“Lying won’t get you out of here any sooner, Agent Barton.”

***

He was faking sleep.

He was surprised they hadn’t acknowledged it. Steve at least should have been able to hear his heart jackhammer when he woke to find he was no longer alone. Tony was speaking in a low whisper, running through words so fast that it took Clint’s exhausted brain a moment to catch up. 

“- can’t just leave him in here _forever._ ”

“We’re trying everything, Tony.” Bruce. That was Bruce. “The Committee will come around, they have to.”

“You didn’t see him the other day,” Rhodey added. “His sanity isn’t going to last forever.”

“Are we sure he isn’t already…” Sam as well. It was a whole party that he wasn’t invited to. “You know.” 

“He’s not.” Steve’s hand took his wrist and he forced himself not to flinch. Reassurance. You didn’t give sleeping people reassurance. “We’re going to figure this out. We’re a team, and we don’t abandon people. We’re going to fix this.”

***

_I’m coming for you._

***

Clint had never felt more abandoned in his life.

***

“I have it!”

Tony didn’t bother announcing himself further as he let himself into Clint’s room, Maria close on his tail.

Wait, no. Not his room, never _his_ room.

The genius looked more animated than Clint had seen him in...weeks? He wasn’t sure anymore. The goddamn hellish lights.

Tony ignored the protests of a squawking nurse as he dropped into the vacated visitor’s chair, ushering her from the room. “We’re getting you out.”

Clint’s heart leaped so hard it hurt, head whipping down to the cuffs only to catch Tony’s horrified look as he realized his mistake.

“Not today,” Tony amended, wincing. “Not my best choice of words there. But I do have a new plan.”

Clint closed his eyes, willing the crushed hope to fade faster. “You always have a plan.”

“You bet I do, baby bird.” Clint flinched at the word _baby._

Maria shot him a look that, to the New S.H.I.E.L.D Director’s credit, stopped Tony in his tracks. She turned her attention to Clint. “So you know we’re not only negotiating for you, but for Natasha.”

A pull on the cuffs. “She didn’t do anything.” He’d lost count of how many times he’d said it.

“We know,” Maria assured him.

“Yeah,” Tony cut in. “And the Committee damn well knows it too.”

Clint narrowed his eyes at him. “What does that mean?”

“They’re saying she’s under arrest because of the incident in the med bay,” Maria said before Tony could. Clint snorted at the word ‘incident’. The clinical terminology wasn’t fooling anyone. “But we actually think they’re holding her there as leverage.”

Clint looked between them, suspicion growing. “What would they need leverage for?”

Maria and Tony shared a look before Tony took the lead. “You know why they’re keeping you here, right?”

“Yeah,” Clint replied dryly. “Five people.”

“Well, ok, yes,” Tony admitted. “But more so because they don’t believe that all those marbles are in that attic. For the record, I think you’re as sane as the rest of us. Although, that’s hardly a comfort, come to think of it.”

“Get on with it, Stark.”

“Long story short: they’re saying they need proof that you know you are on this frankly shitty plane of reality, and therefore you’re not going to do it again.”

“I’ve told them I know this is real. They don’t believe me.”

“They don’t believe _you,_ no. But there is someone they are saying they would believe.”

Clint glared at him. “I think I’m past the point of caring about well-timed reveals.”

Maria took over, trying to diffuse the tension. “They’re saying they would believe Wanda Maximoff.”

It was the last name Clint expected to hear, and Tony spoke up before it had had a chance to sink in. “They know all about her witchy little mind powers. And considering they’re not so thrilled about what’s going on in that head -” He went as though to tap Clint on the forehead, only to hastily back off at the glare Clint sent his way. “They’re saying that if she were to come in and prove everything is hunky-dory in there, then we can get you out of here. And get Nat back home while we’re at it.”

Clint let out a laugh, unable to help himself. It sounded manic even to him. “That’s not seriously the best you can come up with?”

“We didn’t come up with it,” Maria reminded him. “And yes, for the record, I think it’s total bullshit.”

“So what,” Clint demanded. “You bring Wanda in, she messes around in my head, and then we’re all peachy?”

“Not exactly,” Maria said quietly. “There were still...victims. With families. They deserve some kind of justice.”

“But you wouldn’t be in here.” Tony gestured around the white room. “And my lawyers could almost definitely swing you house arrest. Um, eventually, anyway. There would probably be some time they’d want served. But maybe even that could be avoided if you helped us -”

“Stark.” Maria cut him off with a glare, Clint sensed cutting off a conversation that had already happened.

“What?” he demanded.

Maria didn’t take her eyes off Tony as she said, “Clint, I’m telling you this because I want to keep you in the loop. But that doesn’t mean I expect you to do this. I know what Wanda means to you.”

“Maximoff would be fine,” Tony argued. “Steve already cut a deal for her with Harding if she came in quietly.” He thrust a hand at Clint. “You just said it - they mean a lot to each other. That goes both ways. Are you seriously saying she wouldn’t want to help if she could?”

Maria met him head-on. “You know the Committee isn’t going to just let her be if she turns herself in-”

“No, but it would be better than -”

“It would not be _better_ -”

“Clint,” Tony swung away from Maria, laying a hand on Clint’s wrist, just above the cuff. “They’re going to hold onto Nat until we do this. And I promise that Wanda would be _fine_ -”

“Right, because you give a damn about Wanda,” Clint snapped at him, cutting him off. “Piss off, Stark. Maria’s right.”

Tony wasn’t backing down. “I know it sounds crazy, but so is half the shit we do weekly. I’m busting you out of here, Barton. You just have to trust me on this.”

“Trust _you?_ ” Clint spat at him, making Tony recoil. “You want to bust me out? _Do_ it already.” And he yanked on the cuffs, not expecting a single change. Except, finally, there was give. Just not on the leather.

Clint stared blankly at his bleeding wrists, the split skin just visible below the cuff edges. Tony swore before diving out of the way of the nurse who sprinted back into the room to clean him up.

He didn’t even feel it. His mind was racing.

So. Wanda.

Huh.

***

“Tony and Hill told you what the Committee wants.”

They’d sent Sam this time. Clint was twisting his newly bandaged wrists in the blood-stained restraints. The nurses had made a token attempt to get it out, but he could still see the marks.

“Doesn’t matter,” Clint got out. “They’ve been looking for Wanda for months. They won’t find her.”

Sam bit his lip. “I know. But they think you know where she is.”

Clint glared at the ceiling. “So hand over Wanda or Natasha gets locked away in the Raft forever?”

Sam sighed. “That’s one way to look at it.”

“Like there’s any other way?”

Sam twisted his hands together. “I hate it,” he admitted. “It’s dirty, and it’s low, and it’s the exact reason we didn’t sign the Accords in the first place.”

Clint squinted at him. “So?”

“And I know Stark’s got every lawyer worth a damn on the case. And hey, they might pull off some hattrick that avoids all of this…

“But you think I should help them find Wanda anyway.”

“I’m just saying,” Sam pressed. “If the choice is between Wanda under house arrest in the Compound or Natasha under arrest in Raft and you committed to this place permanently...”

Clint forced his face to stay neutral at the word _permanently._

“Then I don’t think it’s hard to see the lesser of those two evils.”

“Wanda blew up twenty-six people including eleven relief workers from Wakanda,” Clint reminded him.

“An accident. No one’s more been adamant about that than you.”

“The Committee doesn’t see it that way. They didn’t then, and they won’t now. You get her here, they’re locking her up, not listening to her defend a fellow murderer.”

_“Clint.”_

“I’m telling it how they’ll see it.”

Sam sighed. “I’m not saying you’re wrong. But Tony is convinced that he has half of the science down behind Wanda’s powers, and if he can figure out the rest and present that to the Committee -”

“Stark doesn’t give a damn about Wanda’s safety either. That’s been proved.”

Sam shuffled, uncomfortable. “I’m not saying I agreed to his reaction to Lagos either, but you know this deal is somehow going to need to extend to Vision as well - someone from Stark’s side of things, if that helps. And I’ve seen the proposals, and they’re not as terrible as you might think.”

Clint shifted on the bed. “It’s a moot point anyway,” he muttered. “I have no idea where she is.”

Sam rubbed his eyes, letting the tiredness show. “This is what we have. We’re backed into a corner, but we’re _trying,_ Clint.”

Clint didn’t back down, letting the challenge show in his next words. “Yeah? Well, I’m not letting you bring Wanda here. So you’ll have to try harder.”

***

He was pretty sure it had been over a month now.

***

“We’ve been looking for Wanda.”

It was Steve’s first visit to him in a couple of weeks. Clint didn’t blame him. He wouldn’t want to visit himself either. They didn’t talk anyway, falling into the same routine of Steve thumbing through a book while Clint stared resentfully at the ceiling. 587 holes. 

“I didn’t tell you to do that.”

“Clint, if she can help you -”

“They’ll just arrest her.”

“I worked out a deal with the Committee -”

“Fuck the committee.”

“Language.”

“And fuck you too.”

***

 _“Barton._ Wake up.”

“Wasn’t sleeping.”

“Really? You looked dead. I was kind of freaked out for a moment there, except I trust my machines and they’re saying you’re alive.”

“I don’t feel alive.”

Hands. Worn but warm, covered with more scars and burns than met the eye. Clint had always liked Tony’s hands. The hands of a mechanic; not a billionaire. “Don’t be like that.”

Clint risked cracking an eye open. “Are you here to break me out?”

Tony grimaced. “I mean, you could say I am, in a way. You know the only thing stopping them from letting you go is convincing them you don’t think you’re in cuckoo land anymore.”

“Was that a bird joke?”

“And say if we knew someone with witchy, glowy mind powers who could -”

“Steve’s already tried this today.”

“Oh.” Tony deflated. “Well, our lines of communication haven’t exactly been stellar as of late.”

“I don’t even know where Wanda is.”

Tony perked up a little. “So if we found her, you’d be willing to try?”

“You won’t find her.”

“No? She’s running around with the most advanced technology this planet has ever seen. I should know, I built him. Part of him. You really don’t think I won’t find them if it’s going to help you fly the coop?”

“Stop making bird puns.”

“Never.” 

“You won’t find her.”

Tony hesitated. “Ok. Don’t get mad.”

Clint stared down at his restraints, then back at Tony. “Bit late for that. Isn’t that the whole reason we’re here? I went _mad?”_

“You’re not and the red Power Ranger is going to prove to that Committee otherwise.”

“Not if you don’t know where she is.”

“Here’s the thing…” Tony glanced over towards the door. “I don’t know where she is, sure. But I’d gamble my dad’s entire car collection that you do. Or at least, that you know how to find her.”

“I don’t.”

“Come off it. You think if Peter went on the run with an out-of-the-blue love interest I would let him drop off the grid entirely? No. I’d keep tabs.”

“Then you’d be an idiot.”

“My IQ tests and various degrees very much say otherwise. As does my gut and I know you haven’t lost contact entirely.”

“I don’t know where she is.”

“Ok, but if you know how to find her -”

“I’m tired.”

Tony pulled away, frustrated. “At least think about it? Because, Clint, honestly…I think this might be the only option.”

***

He thought about it. He thought about it a lot.

***

“I know it sounds unlikely, but we _can_ make this work.”

Pepper was back, a PowerPoint-style hologram spread out in front of Clint’s bed. “Not everyone on the Committee is against you or the ‘rogues’.” Her tone put air quotes around the word. “This woman, for example.”

A dark-skinned woman with short hair flashed up on screen. It took Clint a moment to recognize the woman who had opened the window for him during his Kilgrave takedown. “You’ve really done your research.”

“And Wanda’s powerful, but she’s young,” Pepper continued. “That counts in her favor. And bringing in Sergeant Barnes has gone about as well as it could have, so that sets a good precedent.” She went on another fifteen minutes or so, running through how she would present Clint’s case to the Committee. “Of course, none of that matters if we don’t know where Wanda is.”

“I can’t help you with that.”

Pepper closed the PowerPoint, taking up the now-worn visitor’s chair at Clint’s bedside. “If she comes in, we’ll protect her. Just like we’re trying to protect you.” She hesitated before adding, “And Natasha.”

Clint turned his hands over in the cuffs, feeling the bandages pull against the leather. “Yeah, right. I feel very protected.”

***

Two months.

***

“I know this is real. I know the people are real. I’m not going to attack anyone.”

“Saying the words we need to hear aren’t the same as believing them.”

***

“You could go home,” Steve was saying, keeping his low voice. “We want to have you back with us. We miss you.”

The ceiling was getting blurry. He felt Steve take his wrist and jerked his hand. He couldn’t move it away, but Steve took the hint and backed off.

“At least let me ask her,” Steve pressed him. “This is her decision too. If you know where she is -”

“Stop it.”

“For the record,” Steve said gently. “I’m not meant to tell you, but I thought you should know.”

“Spit it out.”

“We had to tell Laura you’re in here.”

Clint’s breath caught.

“Clint?”

“Don’t say her name.” Steve’s face swam in front of him, and to his horror he felt liquid starting to drip towards his lip. He tried to sniff it back, but it caught in his throat instead, starting off a round of coughing that did nothing to stop his streaming nose.

“Here.” The bed was moved, the back lifting higher, and Clint gasped in oxygen as he was lifted into an easier breathing position. Steve gripped a box of tissues, hesitated as he took in the situation, then decided to go for it as he ripped a tissue from the packet and leaned over to wipe Clint’s nose. Just like Laura would do to Nate. 

“Get off me, Rogers!”

Steve didn’t even flinch back, just calmly disposited the tissue in the trash can, even though his shoulders were rigid with tension.

“Steve.”

“Let me get you some water.”

“Take them off.”

“You know I can’t do that.”

“I wouldn’t be able to get past you.” He was begging, he was begging and so far beyond caring. “Please, please, just five minutes - just one minute. Just take them off, _please,_ Steve - ”

“If you let me get Wanda, then we can, ok? Not just for five minutes. For good.”

Clint slammed his head back into the pillows, trying to make it hurt. It didn’t.

***

“Just _stop_ this.”

Tony again.

“Just help us find…Clint. _Clint.”_

***

“We can’t find her.”

Clint was sure the Director of New S.H.I.E.L.D. had more important things to be doing than visiting psych patients, but he wasn’t about to point that out. “I never wanted you to. I thought you were on my side with this.”

Maria leaned back, hands tightly folded in her lap.

He knew what the expression on her face meant before she said it, so he said it first. “They’re not going to let me out.”

“We haven’t given up. I think the team was hanging a lot on having Wanda come in, but it doesn’t seem like that’s going to happen so…” She tried for a watery smile. “But I do have some good news.”

Of course she did.

“We managed to negotiate a plea for Natasha. She’s going to serve six months on the Raft, then she’ll be free to go.”

A nausea that had nothing to do with the drugs filled his stomach. He swallowed sickly. _“Six months?”_

“From her time of incarceration. It’s the best we could do without involving Wanda.”

“Then your best isn’t good enough. She didn’t even _do_ anything.”

“We know,” Maria said softly. “But also…”

“Spit it out.”

“It’s a show of good faith. It’s not just you the Committee doesn’t trust; it’s the team. So they’re proving they can play by their rules, that they can take the punishments they deem fair.”

Clint gulped back bile. “So they’re just going to let Natasha rot there.”

“She agreed to it,” Maria explained. “She’s going to be model prisoner, and the rest of the team are going to be model -”

“Jailers?”

“Maybe that’s fair,” she allowed. “But they think that if Natasha serves her sentence without issue then they’ll have gained some ground to fight your case on. Without Wanda getting involved,” she repeated, then, softer. “That’s what you wanted, right?”

Clint shut his eyes, trying to fight the clawing panic rising in his chest. “Six months. So how long -”

“Four months and seven days from today.”

The cuffs became suffocatingly tight.

***

“I’ll be good.”

He didn’t know who he was pleading with. He’d gone completely feral for no other reason than pure animal terror and frustration caused by everything and nothing all at once, and then that metal thing was back between his teeth as they pumped sedatives into his veins. He was awake again, mouth free, unsure of who it was was trying to shush him.

“I’ll be _good,”_ he repeated. “I won’t fight, I won’t leave the room, I’ll just…just…off. Off, please, just _off.”_

***

_“I’ll be good.”_

_“That’s what you said last time. And were you good? No. So this is going in.”_

_He was trying to squirm away, but the ring just kept getting closer and there was nowhere for him to go. “I mean it this time.” He meant to say it, but it was cut off as metal forced his mouth open again._

_“Maybe you do,” Duquesne said. “But it always pays to make sure.”_

***

_I’ll always come for you._

He had a new plan.

***

He stopped fighting. He stopped doing much of anything.

He didn’t acknowledge the visitors, or the nurses, or the doctors. They weren’t going to help. They weren’t the way out.

***

The psychologists had stopped coming to ask if he thought this was real or not. 

He didn’t think that was a good sign.

***

587 ceiling holes. If he let his eyes go blurry, they doubled and became 1,174 and took twice as long to count.

***

He thought it had been four months now.

***

He wished he hadn’t yelled at Steve for trying to read to him. He wished he would now.

But Steve didn’t come to visit him anymore. None of them did.

*** 

Five months.

***

587.

***

Budapest.

***

He didn’t know how long it had been. How long he had been tied to this damn bed counting holes in a white ceiling. But it had been long enough for Natasha’s hair to grow from the stubble it had become after the Tower fire to well past her ears. It wasn’t sleek and shiny, or in the gorgeous red curls he had loved so much that she had chopped without a second thought. It was lank and scruffy, the burn scars along her jaw red and raw, as if they hadn’t healed properly.

She looked awful. She was thin and pale and worn and, after a half-year flipping between onslaughts of white coats prodding at him, and barren periods of no one but himself for company, she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

“You’re here.” 

She sat in the visitor’s chair, running a hand over his. “I said I would come. Remember?”

He remembered. 

“They’re not going to let me out.”

The hand on his paused. “No. They’re not.”

“Did they tell you about the deal? With Wanda?”

Natasha squeezed his hand. “They did.”

“I could have...I could have gotten you out sooner. I could have -”

“Hey,” she cut him off. “No. I would never want you to do that for me. Ever.”

“They looked for her anyway,” he murmured. “I told them not to, but -”

“They were trying to help you, Clint. They really did. Anything they thought might get you out of here, they tried.”

“Tried? Not trying?”

Natasha tensed. “We’re regrouping. Trying to figure out something else.”

He shook his head. “Doesn’t matter.”

“We’re not leaving you here.”

 _But you did leave me here._ “They’re not going to let me out. They’re never going to let me out.”

“Don’t say that.”

Clint leaned against the pillows, trying not to tense. This was it. Four months and seven days from Maria’s announcement, he had been waiting for this. “They didn’t find Wanda.”

“No.”

“That means she and Vision are in a place that even Tony Stark and New S.H.I.E.L.D. can’t track down. Even if they were looking as hard as they possibly could.”

Natasha’s hand tightened on his. “You told them you didn’t know where she is.”

“I lied,” Clint whispered. “She’s in a safe place. They’d never find it.” He didn’t want to look at Natasha. Not with what he was about to do. “I could get there. But I wouldn’t be able to get out of the building on my own.”

She understood immediately. “Then I’ll come with you.”

All 587 holes in the ceiling became blurred. “I’m sorry.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for. Not with me, never with me.”

“If we run, we’re breaking the Accords. We won’t be able to come back. We won’t be able to see the team again, not without getting them arrested. It’ll be goodbye for good.”

She moved from the chair to the side of the bed, tilting his chin up to make him look at her. “I love our team,” she said softly. “But I’ll always love you more.”

Then her hands started to undo the cuffs.

Six months ago he would have tried to blink back the tears, but he was long past caring as he felt cool air against his wrists, Natasha’s arms under his frame and she helped him out of the bed.

He was too uncoordinated, too desperate for freedom, and they both ended up on the floor. It didn’t matter. It wasn’t the bed, and his arms were free to wrap all the way around Natasha and pull her close. “Tell me about Budapest.”

“Always.” She leaned into him, all soft edges that she didn’t bring out around anyone else. “It’s a joke,” she whispered. “A stupid, stupid joke, but it was our joke. Our joke and Phil’s. Big bad Team Delta. If only we had done half the things they said we did. Then we’d be real superheroes. Or villains. Hard to tell the difference sometimes.”

He could feel himself shaking. “I can tell the difference.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Then, “Thank you,” he whispered, before pulling his arms tight and snapping her neck.

***

(Pain)

***

(PAIN)

***

  
  


(Nothing)

  
  


***

It was different this time.

The smells were sharper, rusted iron and bleach. The bed beneath him was hard and unyielding, cuffs around his wrists, pain racking his back, his legs, god his _head -_

Someone was moving behind him, yanking something hard and cold out his mouth as he tensed in the restraints, waiting for a fight when he smelt something else, something beyond the clawing scents of the stone room his eyes were finally adjusting enough to see.

Worn leather and strawberries and one more. The faint scent of fire.

His arms were around her throat the second the straps holding him down were gone, the move too sudden and unexpected for even Natasha to dodge.

“Tell me about Budapest.”

“Always.” They were so close that she could whisper the words in his ear. “I was still Red Room, running missions for the KGB. Fury sent you to kill me. You made a different call. So they came after me, through you. And I killed them all.” Natasha made no reaction to Clint’s hold tightening around her neck as she added, “But that’s not the real story.”

Clint paused, holding his breath, silently begging.

“They never got near you. I went back and killed them all myself. For me. Because I could.”

Clint could feel her heart beating, fast and in time with his.

“And when I told you what I’d done, you said to tell Fury that I’d done it for you. To prove that I could be loyal, that I’d done it for a reason other than vengeance. But I hadn’t. It was bloody and violent and pointless and I regret none of it. And only you and I know that.”

A moment passed. Then Clint let go.

Natasha didn’t. She pressed herself up next to him on the bed that had been his prison, warm and familiar and safe.

“It’s over,” Clint whispered. “This is real.”

“This is real,” Natasha confirmed. “I’m here.”

***

“They know about the farmhouse.”

They were the first words that had tumbled out of him the second he was sure his brain was back on dry land. Natasha had just nodded once, bundled him into the seat of what looked like one of Tony’s Audis, and made a phone call.

Now, Clint was curled in the passenger seat as Natasha sped back to the Compound. He was oscillating between watching the rolling landscapes out the car window and closing his eyes, the over-stimulation too much. The world felt too loud, too bright, tangy and sharp on his tongue.

“Hill’s going to bring Laura and the kids in,” Natasha assured him. “They’ll stay at the Compound under the guise of witness protection, and no one but the team will know who they really are. A jet’s headed their way right now.”

“They’re ok?”

Natasha reached across the gap between him to lay a hand on his knee. He tried not to flinch away, but the touch felt too raw, too much. He kept shifting in his seat, trying to adjust to the sticky leather against his back. He was dressed in clothes that weren’t his; loose sweatpants and a baggy t-shirt that had both retained the clawing iron and bleach smell. He didn’t remember being dressed in them. He didn’t remember anything between getting nabbed in the alley after Bucky had called and waking up in a simulated Compound.

Natasha removed her hand. “They’re ok.”

He didn’t want to think what that meant; that his captors had figured out the farmhouse’s location months ago and hadn’t acted on it. Maybe they had been so sure they’d break him that they hadn’t bothered. He hadn’t had the chance to ask - they had been long gone while Natasha had guided him to freedom.

“They had you hooked up to some machine.”

He heard the unspoken question. _How did they hurt you?_

When he didn’t answer, she back-pedaled to something easier. “How did they grab you?”

He resisted the urge to rub his temples. That felt like several lifetimes ago. “Some device thing.” He gestured to his ears. “Set off the aids, hard. Like a ringing. Blacked out.”

“And then?”

He recognized the push. The _Be an agent and debrief me, because that’s your job and people die when we don’t do it right._ A habit learned straight from Phil.

“And then…” He swallowed. His mouth tasted like metal. “I woke up in Tony’s workshop.” He half-laughed at the choice of words. “Actually, woke up isn’t...yeah, no.”

“They were making you see things.”

“Simulations,” he muttered. “A lot of them. Every time I figured out I was in one they’d reboot me. Easy to take information from someone if they don’t even know they’re giving it.”

And they had taken it - so much of it. Maybe not what they had been looking for, but enough. He ran through the last two simulations, when they had worked so hard to convince him that their warped worlds were his reality. The small details. The fractions that made up his life, stripped out of him piece by piece.

“I think…” He swallowed. “I think I was meant to figure it out, at least at first. I knew it was false so fast, it was always so obvious. The people would look so fake or they’d glitch or wouldn’t know something that they should have.”

Natasha nodded, prompting him to keep going.

“But I don’t think that was the point. I think the point was to run me through enough simulations that they could get enough out of me so that, when they cranked the dial to eleven, I’d buy into it.”

“And did you buy into it?”

There was no accusation in the words. He felt it anyway, but not from Natasha. “No,” he said quietly. “I knew.”

“Because of Budapest?”

“Because of Budapest.” He shuffled in his seat. What he wouldn’t give for a shower and a fresh change of clothes. Not that they were far off.

They had had him barely an hour’s drive away from the Compound. Quicker in a jet or an Iron Man suit. He’d been so close the whole time, so why hadn’t anyone on the team -

“Do you know what they wanted from you?”

A nod.

“Did they get it?”

A shake.

“Is it something we need to act on?”

Clint hesitated at the ‘we’. He knew at least that he had to tell Natasha everything, and soon, but there was so much to tell, and he was tired. So goddamn tired.

The place his captors had been keeping him in had looked like a mix between medieval dungeon and abandoned science lab. It wasn’t until Natasha had guided him towards a ladder on the side of the wall did he realize they were in an underground bunker with thick metal walls. He had scanned them on his way out, looking for something that would have evaded Tony’s technology, or hidden them from an above-ground search. 

He couldn’t see a single thing. The bunker’s hatch wasn’t even well hidden

The place had been empty except for them when he woke up. No bodies, which he assumed meant they had run before Natasha could catch them, and she had seen him hooked up to that machine he hadn’t been strong enough to break himself out of and prioritized. He felt an irrational stab at anger at that, that she had let these people who he had given away Laura’s location to get away, before he reeled himself in. Natasha hadn’t known.

But she wouldn’t have needed to make that choice if she had brought backup. 

“You came alone.”

“I did,” Natasha confirmed. “Figured it was easier to just come get you than to stand around and wait for the Committee’s permission.”

Clint landed on keeping his eyes closed. He shouldn’t have been upset that the others hadn’t come, not really, especially if it was going to mess with the Accords. He still hated the damn things, but he could appreciate the time and effort taken to wrangle them into something not quite so asinine. One missing team member wouldn’t have qualified for undoing months of work.

And six months was a long time. With rare exception, S.H.I.E.L.D. had declared their agents dead or irretrievable within two weeks. Most of the world had given up on Tony Stark well before his three months in Afghanistan were up, and a billionaire weapons designer held a lot more sway than a former circus worker from Iowa. They had probably counted him for dead long ago.

“Was the funeral at least nice?”

Clint hadn’t opened his eyes, but he could feel the look Natasha shot his way, the way her eyes locked onto him. He didn’t respond. He didn’t want to look at her.

Blonde. Her hair was blonde. Still short, but like she had cropped it that way, not like it was still growing back from the fire. She looked good. Really good, bandages and scarring long gone. And he hated that he wanted her to look worse.

“Is there some empty grave with my name on it somewhere? Please say there is. And don’t you dare try to stop me from taking selfies with it.” 

No response.

He could still feel her watching him. “Eyes on the road, Romanoff. I didn’t survive half a year in a mindfuck machine so you could bump me off as roadkill.”

The car screeched to a sudden halt as Clint was thrown forward in his seat, eyes flying open and swearing blue murder as the seatbelt locked against him. He wrenched it off, pushing open the door as his empty stomach tried to eject air, coming up with nothing but bile and saliva. He could feel Natasha’s hands-on him but shoved her off, roughly, unfairly, and he knew it was unfair but still- 

Six months. Six months tied to a goddamn bed and she’d found time to _dye her hair._

“Clint. Look at me.”

He didn’t want to. He didn’t want to see that perfect skin, the perfectly styled cut. He didn’t want to further fuel his need for her to look like a wreck, because that’s what he would be if she had been in enemy hands that long. Then again, he’d always needed Natasha more than she needed him.

“Look at me.” The voice tried stern and, seeing little effect, switched to soft. “Please.”

And, because it was Natasha, he did.

She didn’t try to touch him again, staying close without contact. Those green eyes were narrowed in calculation, finding her way to the end of the puzzle like she always did. Then her hands went to her hair and pushed.

He was still disorientated enough that seeing Natasha’s new blonde locks slide off her head like a shedding snake was a damn acid trip, and that was nothing compared to her sliding a finger behind her ear which made her whole face _shimmer_ -

Clint was forced double again, even though there was nothing in his stomach left to throw up, brain not working fast enough to keep up with the distorted images his eyes were seeing. And if he couldn’t trust his eyes, then what good was he?

Small hands took his calloused ones, warm and familiar, giving him the strength to open his eyes again. There was a blonde wig on the ground next to a sliver of silver that he recognized as a S.H.I.E.L.D. issue cloaking mask. “Can you look at me?”

It was the nervousness in her voice that gave him the strength to do it. His head weighed a hundred pounds but he forced his chin up.

He took it in. The short, uneven hair, barely beginning to grow back. The scarring over one cheek. On her nose. The melted skin that was once an ear.

He inhaled, short and sharp, because he knew the fire damage had been bad, but he’d never seen her without the bandages. He had thought she was getting better. He hadn’t realized the long term damage would be this bad.

“Hey.” A hand shifted to his chin instead as he tried to look away, and maybe it was the fact that it was just the two of them crouched on the side of an empty highway, or that she just didn’t have the energy, but she let the vulnerability of being seen this way etch into every feature of her face.

“Natasha -”

“No. We’re focusing on you right now.”

Clint swallowed again, trying to ignore the taste of vomit. No simulated Bruce to help him wash it out this time. “I thought they were making you better, that the damage wasn’t going to permanent - ”

Then it hit. The truth struck like lightning, and then he was pitching forward with only Natasha’s frame to hold him up. 

“How long? How long did they have me?”

“Total? About two hours.”

His breath hitched.

“Hooked up to that machine? According to their notes, forty-three minutes.”

_Forty-three minutes._

His mind whited out as he remembered the endless repetitions in the workshop, running through simulation after simulation. The weeks that turned to months spent in that white room, counting fake holes in a fake ceiling. 587.

“I came after you the second Bucky called me,” Natasha was saying. “I would have called the others, but that might have involved the Committee and I figured you’d left the Compound to see -”

“Ok.” The word was flat, lifeless. “Ok.”

“Hey.” Then she was pushing him up, leaning him back against the car so she could place her hands on either side of his head. “Listen to me. Do you really think I’d ever leave you in enemy hands for a second longer than I could help it? Do you think any of us would?”

A lump formed in his throat. He leaned his head back as far as he could as though he could swallow it. 

_“Clint._ Tell me you don’t think that.”

“I hurt them.”

“Who? Who did you hurt?”

“Everyone. Hara, Tony, _you.”_

“It was a simulation. You knew they weren’t real.”

“You can’t know that.”

“I do know that, because I know you. _I know you.”_

“Then you know hurting people isn’t exactly an issue for me.”

“When you’ve had to, sure. And you’ve had to a lot. That doesn’t mean -”

He was shaking his head at her. “It was the only way out. The only way out was to convince them that I knew it was fake, and I knew killing a friend would do that.” It was flooding out now. “So they put me somewhere where I couldn’t hurt anyone. And I thought if I could make them think that I knew it was real, then they’d untie me and I could prove it by killing whichever friend they put in front of me. That maybe that would finally overload their machine -” The laugh that followed was hollow. “It was such a small shot, but I took it anyway. I killed you.”

“It wasn’t real.”

He wasn’t finished. “I killed you because I gave up on you coming back for me.”

The silence that followed that statement rang out across the picturesque green fields, through the calm blue skies untainted by clouds. Because the world could look beautiful even though the people in it weren’t; because the air could taste fresh and clean even as he choked on acid and bile.

Natasha broke the silence. “Look at me.”

He shook his head at her.

“Clinton Francis Barton. _Look at me.”_

It seemed to take an age for him to peel his head away from the car to meet her eyes. “I don’t care what you do,” she said, her voice low. “You could hurt me. Or hurt our friends. You could burn down the Compound with everyone still inside. If you are in trouble, _ever_ \- I am coming for you.”

At some point her hands had slid around his shoulders. She was the only thing keeping him upright.

“Because I know you, inside and out, and because I know you’ve had to make some horrible decisions and that you’re going to make more in the future. I also know that you don’t make those kinds of decisions unless you’re backed into a corner, and that your life has been nothing _but_ corners. And when that’s your reality, when your life is whittled down to just surviving, what seems like the worst thing in the world to someone else can be the best thing through your eyes. _Your_ eyes, Clint. You see the world for it is, every decaying, rotten part of it, and you decide to fight for the good in it anyway. Because you’re the kind of man who was sent to end a mass-murderer and instead saw not just an asset, but a friend. You saw that tiny spark left in me that they never quite managed to wipe away, even when no one else did. Even when I didn’t, even when I still don’t. And that is the kind of man this team needs and will fight for every second to make sure you’re safe.”

He wanted the words to wash it all away. Feeling Tony leave his arms on the roof, his arms breaking Natasha’s neck, the sense of knowing he was knowing he was a prisoner that no one was coming to save.

“And I know all that because I know you, but you want further proof? It worked. You broke that damn machine from the inside out.”

His whole body tensed at that. “Don’t lie to me.”

“I would never.”

He stared at her. “No, you…you broke me out. You found me and you broke me out.”

She shook her head. “They must have known I was coming, because they were gone before I got there. Only by a few minutes though, I think.” Her eyes went hard for a second as she reflected on the loss. “And you were on that bed. I was a few seconds from calling Tony and Bruce to ask what the hell I was supposed to do and then you just woke up. You woke up and the machine stopped. You broke it. They put you through hell and you broke out, because that’s who you are. And because that’s one of the many, many reasons I love you. So please hear me when I say this: I will always come for you. Every single damn time, no matter what. _I will come for you.”_

Clint wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that on the side of the road, not a single car passing them by. Finally, he let Natasha wipe his cheeks and help him back into the car, making the solitary drive back to the Compound.

“Nat,” he said finally, so quiet she was surprised she heard him.

“Ask me anything.”

“What does _Mens et Manus_ mean?”

She didn’t question it. “It’s the MIT motto.”

Oh. So not an in-joke between Rhodey and Tony at all. Just more of them fucking with him. “Ok.”

She put her hand back on his knee, and this time he didn’t flinch away from the touch. 

He let out a long breath as the Compound came into view, shooting a look at the car clock. It hadn’t even cracked noon yet. He’d only left this morning.

Natasha pulled the car into the garage, but made no move to get out. Instead, she slipped her wig and mask back on, melting back into the perfect agent. She looked ahead, giving him his fifteen seconds.

That's all he ever needed before a mission. Fifteen seconds to push back thoughts of the farmhouse - he hadn't even started to comprehend its loss - and the fact that they knew. _Someone_ knew. It was no longer safe, and there was nothing he could do about that now. Guilt about giving it to them in the first place would have to wait.

Then his fifteen seconds were up, and there was work to do.

They had to talk to Hill, to the team, find out who had him, where they had gotten the machine, and where they were now.

And to find out why they had gone to so much effort to find Wanda Maximoff.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Whumptoberverse will continue in "Project Cassandra"
> 
> This is also the second part of a Clint-based trilogy within in the Whumptoberverse, the first part being “Room 101” and the third part being the upcoming “Barton Luck.”

**Author's Note:**

> Come scream at me on [Tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/jinxquickfoot), especially if you also write fanfic or do fanart! Share your work with me!
> 
> If you're liking the work I'm putting out on Ao3 and want to support me as creator elsewhere, it would mean the world to me if you were to check out my writing podcast 'Kill the Cat', which is available on [YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ypaen3yM5Q&t=1s&ab_channel=KilltheCatPodcast), [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/show/5hCprc9UCBZP4srFrBXKT1?si=VeMJEMn8SXOm2FiRCNkN0g), or anywhere you listen to podcasts and hit that subscribe button, or my web series 'Codependent' which can be viewed/subscribed to [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_EF7OOOYPU&list=PL-sJO_AxBYjddRzm1Q6F9Wb99ea_R2ju1&index=2&ab_channel=CatSole).


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